NGOs and Development in Bangladesh: Making poverty history or making poverty business?

From its birth as an independent nation in 1971, Bangladesh became a site for Non Government Organisations. Initially focussed on relief and rehabilitation activities following the War of Liberation and succeeding natural calamities, International and local NGOs turned their efforts to longer term development in the absence of state capacity to deliver welfare. By the mid 1980s still lacking a strong state, NGOs were faced with the challenge/opportunity to deliver social services into the long term and became the champions of “sustainable development”. International NGOs spun off their operations and “client” base into local and national NGOs. Bangladeshi NGOs found many opportunities for partnership with the growing international community of development NGOs, and Northern/Western government Development Agencies. During the 1990s the NGO sector in Bangladesh grew rapidly. NGOs developed business strategies to both provide outlet for beneficiaries’ produce and to deliver goods and services to their “target groups”. Local income has become increasingly important in strategies for sustainability of the organisations and the careers of their employees. Some NGOs are now the largest providers of a range of services in Bangladesh, and their role with respect to the poor, business and government has become increasingly subject to debate