ZCZC
BSS-27
NHD-PROGRAMME
Third phase of national household database begins
DHAKA, June 25, 2018 (BSS) – The third phase of National Household
Database (NHD) programme began today to prepare a flawless database to
identify economic status of the people aiming to eliminate poverty.
The government has set a target of collecting data from 3.5 crore
households of the country for preparing NHD to find out the number of poor
people to bring them under social safety-net programme, Md Shafiul Alam,
Project Director of NHD, told the inaugural function of Training of Trainers
(ToT) at Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) here.
The National Household Database Project under the BBS has organised the
training programme in cooperation with Thengamara Mohila Sabuj Sangha (TMSS).
Secretary-in-Charge of Statistics and Informatics Division, Additional
Secretary (Development) of Statistics and Informatics Division Bikash Kishore
Das, Director of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) of TMSS Nigar
Sultana and Project Director of NHD Programme Md Shafiul Alam, among others,
addressed the function with BBS Director General Md Amir Hossain in the
chair.
According to the NHD programme, first phase and second phase of the
programme have been implemented successfully. A total of 17 districts of
Rangpur, Barisal and Mymensingh divisions were under the first phase of NHD
programme.
Under the second phase, data were collected from households in 25 districts
of the three divisions – Dhaka, Chittagong and Mymensingh.
The NHD project was officially launched in 2013 and it will be completed by
December, 2018, the project sources said.
“We are using Proxy Mean Test-Formula (PMTF) to assess economic status of
every household in Bangladesh,” Shafiul said adding data will be collected
from households of 22 districts under three divisions – Rajshahi, Khulna and
Sylhet.
Bikash said, “NHD, an online database, will be prepared based on economic
status of every household to bring the target group under the social safety-
net programme which will remove all sorts of irregularities.”
BBS DG Amir said, “As the country has no household database, we cannot
assess economic condition at family level, which is hampering the poverty
reduction efforts of the government. I believe that the NHD will remove
overlapping practices of social safety-net programmes.”
Nigar Sultana said, “We have completed first phase of NHD project
successfully with valuable cooperation of the local administration. Without
the assistance of local administrations, we would not have been able to
prepare a perfect household database.”
After preparing of NHD, real beneficiaries will be included in the social
safety-net programme, she said adding NHD will significantly help achieve
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) through successful implementation of
social safety-net programme.
BSS/MMR/ARS/1909 hrs