Channelling zakat collectively can cut poverty: analyst

Institutionalisation of zakat funds can play a vital role in poverty alleviation and is an innovative process of collectively disseminating wealth, Mirza Azizul Islam, former adviser to a caretaker government, said yesterday.

He was addressing a programme titled “Presentation on impact assessment of CZM Jeebika project” organised by the Centre for Zakat Management (CZM) in the capital's Lakeshore Hotel.

Initiated by Rahimafrooz in 2008, the CZM privately collects zakat, a mandatory dissemination of a fraction of the “excess” wealth acquired by Muslims over a year, to help change the lives of financially insolvent people.

Jeebika is one project undertaken by the CZM for poverty-prone riverside neighbourhoods on the eastern outskirts of Chittagong city. 

Islam suggested investing the CZM fund for healthcare.

Prudential norms are needed to manage zakat funds to make such development projects sustainable, said Salehuddin Ahmed, a former Bangladesh Bank governor. Auditing through a chartered accountancy firm is also required to ensure transparency in utilisation of the fund, he said.

Institutionalisation of zakat fund will aid financial inclusion, said Ahmed, suggesting that the CSR mobilise banks' corporate social responsibility funds as those were being misused and that tax incentives be provided to promote such efforts.

The zakat fund is based on morality and has to be utilised in a manner which retains that quality, said Hossain Zillur Rahman, executive chairman of the Power and Participation Research Centre.

He gave a presentation on the Jeebika project, saying that 450 households were each initially provided Tk 20,000 between 2011 and 2017.

The average monthly income of each household more than doubled from Tk 7,469 to 17,412 while dependency on moneylenders dropped from 61.9 to 1 percent, he said. Zafrullah Chowdhury, founder of Gonoshasthaya Kendra, called upon the CZM to invest in cancer hospitals.

Niaz Rahim, chairman of the governing body of the CZM, was present among others.

The CZM announced holding the “Sixth Zakat Fair 2018” at Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation on May 11-12 with the  theme “Making a Difference with Zakat”, aiming to motivate Muslims to give zakat in a planned way.

Other programmes of the CZM in 37 districts include ones on livelihood development, healthcare and nutrition for mother and children, education and skills development for unemployed women and youth.