Greetings from all the PEP team of workers!

We hope that you and all family are well. With cooler weather beginning here at night and early morning, we suspect that it will begin to also get cold in Deutschland.

Our development work in Bangladesh is continuing to progress nicely. At present, one of our main activities has been to provide small grants for economic and social development of our poorest rural families. Almost all grants are for Euro 12 per family or less. They include purchasing a goat, a few chickens or ducks, help for a small business or trade activity (selling vegetables, dry goods, etc. through head load from village to village), making and selling bamboo goods and the like.

A second important activity is in the area of health care treatment. We constructed a two-story hospital in a very interior rural area and are now operating it. We also continue to provide vitamin-A capsules and de-worming medicine to children under-5 years old, multivitamins for pregnant and nursing women as well as young children. This year we have taken responsibility for 5 other organizations to get these medicines and help in their areas of the country. A third health treatment activity has been to get good professional medical care for poor people; when necessary, they are brought to Dhaka for high quality treatment. Unfortunately, two children for whom we recently arranged treatment for some months have died. Parvez, a boy of 9, died from leukemia and Sumaiya, a 7-year old girl, died from a heart defect.
 

In Dhaka, we continue to work with the street children in our Mohammadpur area. Today, we had an early morning football match, followed by a small breakfast for 115 children (street children and children from a resettlement camp in the city). 60 children have gone by bus to the Dhaka Zoo as a special treat and spent the day there with a few of our workers; a picnic lunch was included. Report is that they enjoyed it greatly, but some staff were worried when the children roared at the lions and the lions returned the roars. A Bangladeshi friend, who visited our street children’s project, will be starting to provide education three times per week to the children at his own cost. A former accounts officer of our organization, who previously donated Euro 250 for the morning breakfast project, has indicated that he will purchase warm clothing for 50 children to deal with the cold weather which is just beginning.
The PEP Child Development Centers (CDCs), where children get the first two years of primary education, continue year-round. There are 48 CDCs this year with a total 1,440 children getting basic education and a daily nutritious snack. We are working on a major proposal to an international donor to increase the number of CDCs, initially doubling the number and eventually raising it to about 600 per year to help 18,000 poor children annually begin their journey for a new life.

PSDI in the US has recently arranged a donor to expand our garment and embroidery small industry. The fund will be transferred in early November. The scale of work will be increased over the coming year to raise the number of women gainfully employed from 10 to 26, with part payment to 8 own workers, including those responsible for the marketing. A group of young people, including some who visited here during their university years, has committed to raise funds during the coming year to help expand also our silk industry activities. The number of women earning regular income from silkworm rearing, thread spinning and cloth making would expand from 12 to 34 when this grant would be realized.
 
Warmest regards,
Mizan and William