Aaurhi to promote female farmers

An outlet facilitating the direct sale of safe food and agro-based products of women farmers and small-scale entrepreneurs was inaugurated in the capital's Gulshan yesterday.

“Aaurhi” will be run by Kendrio Krishok Moitree, an alliance of farmers, with support from ActionAid Bangladesh, says a press release.

Guests at the opening noted that though women in Bangladesh were directly involved with agricultural production alongside different income generating activities, their presence was sparse in markets.

The outlet's opening is a part of a project to increase women's income by making markets more accessible for them, through climate resilient sustainable agriculture and recognising, redistributing and reducing unpaid care work.

The “Promoting Opportunities for Women's Empowerment and Rights” project is being run by ActionAid Bangladesh encompassing over 6,000 smallholder rural women entrepreneurs and farmers at four upazilas in Gaibandha, Lalmonirhat and Dinajpur.

The Dutch foreign affairs ministry is funding the five-year project, which was launched in January 2016.

Attendees at the programme include Dhaka North City Corporation Mayor Atiqul Islam, ActionAid Bangladesh Country Director Farah Kabir, Kendrio Krishok Moitree's President Sajeda Begum, media personalities Afzal Hossain, Abdun Noor Tushar and Afsana Mimi and Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies' Senior Research Fellow Nazneen Ahmed.