Bangladesh activities
Refugee women and girls project
This project is taking place in Malaysia, Thailand, Myanmar and Bangladesh, to address gender commitments in the Global Compact on Refugees in different refugee situations. The work in these sites is funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT).
Overview
Working in Malaysia, Thailand and Bangladesh, the project is being conducted in close partnership with local academics, refugee women and refugee services. To respond effectively to different refugee contexts, the project has taken a slightly different approach in each country, using the research team’s signature Reciprocal Research methodology.
Our local partners will take forward the work of the project, to achieve the long-term objectives of increasing refugee women’s participation and ending sexual and gender-based violence
Partners and collaborators
Academic partner: Manzoor Hasan, Muhammad Badiuzzaman and Nahida Akter, Centre for Peace and Justice (CPJ), BRAC University, Dhaka
Organisational partners/ collaborators: Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network (APRRN), UNHCR Cox’s Bazar, IOM, Relief International, with the participation and support of numerous other local and international NGOs.
A tailored approach
In each country, the project approach is being adapted to suit local needs and context. In Bangladesh, following consultation with local stakeholders, the research team developed a multi-stage, multi-stakeholder approach to undertaking the research consultations, to better respond to the huge population of refugees. The aim was to work with service providers and identified refugee women and men leaders as principal researchers, to undertake research consultations and develop proposals to address gender and diversity issues in the camps and host community. This was agreed as an effective way to add value to existing gender programs and to support the longer-term capacity of local organisations and refugee community members to respond to gender and diversity needs in the community.
Building local research capacity
Experiential trainings in the project methodology were held with camp-based refugee women and men leaders and with UNHCR and NGO partners in November 2019. These involved 152 participants, including 42 refugee women and 20 refugee men. They prepared participants to undertake camp-based research consultations with Rohingya refugees. UNHCR and other partner NGOs provided additional support for the expanded scope of the project in Bangladesh. A committee of local service providers took responsibility for coordinating the camp-based research consultations.
Locally led research consultations, and analysing the data
The refugee women and men worked in teams with UNHCR/NGO staff to lead 16 camp level research consultations in December 2019 and January 2020, reaching a total of 165 Rohingya women and 69 men. Each group produced detailed documentation of their consultation.
Three Data Analysis workshops with the refugees and NGO/UN staff who had facilitated and documented the camp level consultation were held in February 2020. These provided further training and an opportunity to collate, synthesise and analyse the data from the individual camp consultations. The workshops were led by the UNSW team with support from Rachel Tan, APRRN.
The data and suggestions for actions from the refugee participants were discussed in a meeting with stakeholders at the conclusion of this process, with a local action plan and next steps planned for mid-2020. However COVID 19 has necessitated some adaptations to this plan. The report launch and stakeholder presentation planned for November 2020 has also been postponed.
COVID impacts and next project stages:
The project was always designed to work in a range of diverse contexts, and to provide remote support for local actions, so the UNSW team obtained approval from DFAT to adapt the project to respond to the current crisis and its impacts on refugee women and girls and their communities. This slightly revised approach provides an opportunity to support and document refugee women-led and local NGO supported gender sensitive responses in the context of a humanitarian emergency.
Given the increased risks of sexual and gender-based violence and in particular heightened risks of domestic violence during COVID restrictions, projects and strategies to reduce and address these risks were prioritised. As Government restrictions preclude the employment of refugees and the direct funding of refugee-led initiatives in Bangladesh, the UNSW team partnered with local NGO Lighthouse to provide support for the initiatives being led by informal networks of refugee women working in the camps in activities designed to prevent and address the impacts on COVID-19 on women and children. Evaluation, analysis and recommendations from this project, among others, will be part of the final outcomes for the overall project.
