What works in Bangladesh

Bangladesh has implemented several large-scale social and digital programmes with quantified impacts. The Female Secondary School Assistance Programme (FSSAP) cut girls' dropout from 14.7% to 3.5% and raised girls' secondary enrolment share from 30% to 48%, while a 24-year longitudinal study found it increased age at first marriage by one year. The Union Digital Centres network of 5,000+ centres has served 76.8 million people with 150+ e-services, reducing service time by 85% and costs by 63%. Other models—Grameen Village Phone (278,570 financed phones by 2006) and Infolady (50+ trained women reaching ~50,000 households weekly)—show innovation in rural access to telecommunications and information services, though evidence for these is observational or descriptive rather than from rigorous impact evaluations.