Stuff only: Visit to villages near Sylhet with FIVDB (part 1)

June 21st - 23rd Lon and three of his colleagues participated in a field trip with Friends In Village Development (FIVDB), Sylhet http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIVDB and I was fortunate enough to accompany them.

It was a rather bittersweet field trip that we participated in. The Jonishilon project is working well - there is room for improvement as always, but, it is successfully reaching the most remote and marginalised communities and providing education (both at primary level, and adult literacy), and is working with individuals and communities to provide livelihood opportunities.

But it is an education project, and the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs is no longer funding Education Projects, and so this was a closing down visit.

Lilgaon village in Sylhet Sadar Upazila

We visited a tiny one room corrugated iron school for primary students

Sometimes it all gets too much

The Community Learning Committee is the backbone of the FIVDB project. 70-90% of villagers are members of the CLC - which is the method by which information is disseminated. The long term aim is that the CLC's become self supporting. It is also the forum where choices are made about who gets to undergo some trainings. E.g the whole village would receive health and hygiene training, but only one person would learn how to sew.

A CLC meeting (Community Learning Committee)

Some of the CLC's audience

A play with a message

Vertical sack gardening - even with no land, you can grow food

With a tailoring course and a sewing machine this lady has a small income

Goat rearing

Mogalgaon village - Visit ICT centre

A small project facilitated by FIVDB - IT skills are very much in demand

who needs railings? what is health and safety?

Banagaon village – visit to a duck hatchery - the "farmer? hatcher?" buys fertilised duck eggs at 13.5 tk per piece (13 euro cent - 10 pence).

He then keeps them in a temperature controlled environment (rice husks are used as insulation) and the eggs must be turned four times a day.

28 days later he has a large number of peeping ducklings - which he takes to market when they are 3 days old and they fetch 40tk each. He can make a reasonable profit, but there is an element of risk as he doesn't have a 100% egg:duckling ratio.

Saturday 22nd June

After breakfast we settled in for a two hour drive from Sylhet- through some beautiful countryside and tea estates.

Borolekha Uapzila Moulvibazar

Satkorakandi Village

FIVDB works with villagers to improve their yields, they are only teaching organic methods of farming. Some people have enough land to raise enough crops to sell at a small scale commercial level, but more people have small homesteads where they grow only for home use. Both kinds of farmers receive training.

Hot, hot sun and clear blue skies

Before and after maps of the homestead


composting - household

The plants for the fibres to make matting are now grown by
the edge of this families pond, also helping prevent erosion

Manure compost

From the field office - a table of trainings received under the Jonoshilon project

Taradorom village

Broiler chicken farmer - the conditions the chickens were kept in were better than I had feared - they have more room per chicken than the "bad" poultry farms in The Netherlands - but it was hot and they didn't seem to be coping too well. The farmer had to take out a loan of almost 500 euros, but after two "batches" of chickens had already paid off 200 (interest rates here are typically close to 20%)

another CLC meeting

why yes it is hot - not a two tone shirt

This lady was growing vegetables commercially - she had a long bean crop of
approx 30kg every two days now at the height of growing season. FIVDB trained her on
organic fertilization and crop timing and rotation