Bangladesh

Peace and Development

The Peace and Development Cluster’s core purpose is to advance peace and development by strengthening capacities of local government and communities, with a focus on issues of conflict resolution. Currently the initiatives of the Peace and Development Cluster are being implemented in the Chittagong Hill Tracts area.

The Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) is located in the south-eastern corner of Bangladesh with an area of one-tenth of the size of the country (approximately 5100 square miles) with a population of about 1.5 million people. It is one of the most divers regions of the country in terms of geography, ethnicity, culture and traditions of the peoples. The population is scattered and the terrain hilly, rough and inaccessible.

The region remained largely outside the mainstream of development assistance for more than 25 years due to an insurgency which ended with the signing of the CHT Peace Accord in December 1997. The implementation of the CHT Peace Accord is considered to be central to peace and development in the region. UNDP responded to development needs in 2003 with a Preparatory Assistance project, culminating in a fully-fledges USD 50 million, five year project signed with the Government in 2005, entitled “Promotion of Development and Confidence Building in the CHT" project, establishing the Chittagong Hill Tracts Development Facility (CHTDF). The duration of the first phase of the project was four years which ended in September 2009. Based on the positive impacts of the first phase of the project both UNDP and the Government of Bangladesh decided to extend the project until September 2013. The extension of the project will raise the total budget of the project from US$ 50 million (approximately Tk. 300 Crore) to US$ 160.5 million (approximately Tk. 1100 Crore), thus providing international development assistance of significant scale to the CHT in order to build confidence among the people and institutions of the CHT promoting long term peace and development. In addition to UNDP’s own resources, funds have been made available by the European Commission, Canada (CIDA), Denmark (DANIDA), USA (USAID), Norway, Australia (AusAID) and the Embassy of Japan during the first phase.