Interviews

Muhammad Musa is Executive Director of Bangladesh-based BRAC International, the world’s largest NGO. This interview follows up an earlier Creating Emerging Markets interview with the late Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, the founder of BRAC. Musa develops our understanding of BRAC with a detailed discussion of BRAC’s global expansion, which operated in 12 countries throughout Asia, Africa, and the Middle East by 2020.

Musa begins the interview by describing BRAC’s decision to bring humanitarian and developmental aid to Afghanistan in the aftermath of the US-led invasion of the country in October 2001. Despite resistance from the Taliban, the Sunni Islamist movement which had controlled the government and subsequently formed a militant resistance group, BRAC was able to create positive community support, and set up 3,000 one-classroom schools, focused on bringing education to girls.

Musa describes four common sources of BRAC’s success: deep community involvement; a social enterprise model that addresses both poverty and inequality; a market-based approach that focuses on microfinance, livelihood, and economic empowerment of the middle-income group; and taking a southern approach to the humanitarian and development sector, disrupting the typical North-South development paradigm.

Musa also emphasizes the value of partnering with global entities as well as local grassroots organizations, local communities, and local knowledge to find solutions that work due to the very different contexts and vulnerabilities that exist within and between countries. Musa provides the example of BRAC’s Ultra-Poor Graduation program that began in the mid-1990s in partnership with the World Food Program in an intervention known as Vulnerable Group Feeding, where there was a transfer of assets and food to those living in destitution. After participating in the program for four years, BRAC recognized that it was not solving the problem for those classified as vulnerable. After then working with the vulnerable communities directly, BRAC was able to transition them from destitution to being able to meaningfully participate in the market. After doing this on the ground, BRAC created a model, partnered with research institutions, banks and others, and replicated it in other countries.

In this interview, Musa also narrates the success of one of BRAC’s program’s called Empowerment for Livelihood of Adolescents where job skills, life skills, and decision-making skills are taught. In 2014, the Ebola virus outbreak unexpectedly occurred in West Africa, which decimated the region’s social fabric as children became more vulnerable to abuse, schools closed, and many people lost their source of income. Even as the outbreak was controlled, many children, especially girls, were unable to go back to school. However, a study found that children and adolescents who had participated in BRAC’s Empowerment for Livelihood program saw a significantly lower dropout rate. Musa concludes the interview by reflecting on his thoughts for the future of BRAC. He expresses the view that his earlier optimism that technical solutions would solve major problems in the developing world has diminished. Instead he perceives “social, economic and very complex problems” as the major challenges, which will call for continued experimentation to find solutions.

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