Paper details

Paper authors	Rubayat Jesmin
In panel on	Aligning Large Scale Development Programs with Community Resilience
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

Specifically, for the protracted refugee situations, policymakers, practitioners, and scholars now advocate for durable initiatives (e.g., education and income-generating opportunities for refugees), beyond mere humanitarian assistance. Bangladesh hosts more than one million Rohingya refugees who came from Myanmar to escape their government’s persecution. It appears that the Rohingya refugee issue will not be resolved soon, and sustainable measures need to be initiated to lessen the burden of this disadvantaged population as well as of the host country, Bangladesh. The situation is more vulnerable for refugee women compared to their male counterparts. An in-depth research is planned to identify the factors (facilitating or impeding) the Rohingya refugee women’s economic empowerment so a sustainable framework can be developed. In this context, a pilot study was conducted during July-August 2019 with twenty Rohingya refugee women and ten key informants alongside the participant observation. The findings showed that factors such as marital status, the presence of an adult male in the family, socio-cultural norms and practices, and policies of the host country play major roles than the participants’ intrinsic characteristics (e.g., age, education, and skills) in their aspiration to work and on the choice of type of work.

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