What NGOs Can Learn from BRAC

When I think of NGOs and their creative (and sometimes non-creative ways) they adopt to survive, I usually
think of BRAC (Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee) which I came know about in 1982 when I took a  rural development course with a UNICEF grant at the Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development.

Founded in 1972, the BRAC is considered by the UN as the world's largest NGO. It employs 120,000 people, most of them women. BRAC has projects in all 64 districts of Bangladesh where it has 7 million microfinance group members, 37,500 non-formal primary schools and more than 70,000 health voluntees.  With microfinance and education programs reaching 9 countries in Asia and Africa, its programs reach more than 110 million people!

When I first came to know BRAC in 1982, I was struck by its strategy. I remember being surprised by the fact that the NGO owns and manages a commercial printing press and uses the profit to fund its projects. I remember being skeptical about it being all too familiar with NGO experiences that would end up with plenty of lessons but the capital is gone and the NGO and its members buried in debts.

We used to ascribe each failed business to what was called in my time as "NGO mentality." It means the tendency not to think of commerical activities at all; just focus on service delivery funded by others, such as donors and the Government. It took us three decades to realize that this mentality was the one which pushed us to this critical stage where most NGOs in the world face extinction. We must first be able to fight off this mind-set of always depending on grants to be able to survive.

That was why BRAC came to my mind as I reflected on the sad state of the NGO community at this time in Bohol. To survive, they have allowed their organizations to die in spectacular fashion in a grand surrender of their noble causes to the convenience of working with parties or entities whose goals may not exactly advance their own.

Let us learn from the inspiring BRAC story which is today 80% self-funded and has commercial enterprises, i.e. a dairy and food project, handicraft stores, BRAC salt, etc. to support their mammoth operations and remain faithful to its commitment to organize the poor and based on the understanding of their needs, find "practical ways  to increase their access to resources, support their entrepreneurship and empower them to become agents of change." (Quoted portion from Wikipedia).

To my NGO colleagues, it may be time to consider the BRAC way if we have to fight off being extinct in this new exciting age of entrepreneurship.