Govt clears 1192 NGO projects in July-March

FT ONLINE

The NGO Affairs Bureau has approved some 1192 projects in the first nine months (July-March) of the current fiscal year.

The approved projects of the country’s Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) were 1,037 in FY17.

Thus, the number of approved projects in the first nine months of this fiscal year crossed that of the entire past fiscal year by a wide margin.

Rohingya crisis is one of the push factors in this regard.

Statistics showed that the NGOs received $711.62 million in the first nine months of the current fiscal year as approved fund released through the bureau, which operates under the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO).

The value of released funds for the NGOs was $715.05 million in the past fiscal year.

An analysis prepared by the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) showed that foreign fund disbursed in favour of NGOs was about 20.2 per cent of total Official Development Assistance (ODA) flow to Bangladesh in FY17.

Some 2,610 NGOs have been registered with the bureau so far.