Baridhara Mohila Samobaya Samity, Ltd.

Baridhara Mohila Samobaya Samity, Ltd., is a women's financial cooperative of Dhaka, Bangladesh. With depositors and members numbering nearly 40,000 poor women, it is probably the largest women's organization in Bangladesh, and is believed to be the largest women's cooperative in Asia. It began as a project of Worldvision in 1989; when Worldvision wished to close the project a few years later, the members undertook to operate it themselves. It was after the departure of Worldvision that the Samity's main growth and development took place. Its membership is solely women, who are able to enter into deposit programmes or take out loans. The Samity is distinguishable from Bangladesh's famous microcredit projects in that it charges considerably less interest on loans. Baridhara Mohila Samobaya Samity, Ltd., also works in a charitable partnership with Amarok Society of Canada to provide education programmes in very poor neighbourhoods of Dhaka, training mothers to become family and neighbourhood teachers.