In 2012 AusAID entered a new five-year partnership with the UK Government's aid agency DFID [external link] and the world's largest NGO BRAC [external link] to transform the lives of millions of Bangladesh's poorest and most vulnerable people.
This partnership will help BRAC to continue to provide millions of people with basic health and education services in the poorest and most marginalised communities of Bangladesh, in particular to women and children.
Australia will contribute A$180 million (and the UK A$345 million) over the next five years to:
- support 680,000 children–more than half of them girls–through five years of primary education
- lift 340,000 women and their families out of extreme poverty
- provide contraceptive services to 15 million couples
- ensure that nearly three million women have access to skilled attendants when they deliver their babies.
BRAC is internationally recognised as one of the world's leading development organisations. It began as a grass-roots local initiative in Bangladesh 40 years ago and now reaches 126 million people across Asia, Africa and the Caribbean.
BRAC operates on the philosophy that in order for the poor to come out of poverty, they must have the tools to fight it–such as microfinance, education, healthcare, legal rights training and more. Australia has supported BRAC's poverty reduction programs since 2002.