NPR

Why This Charity Has Stopped Asking For Money

In 2017, No Lean Season raised nearly $12 million to help farmhands in Bangladesh travel to the city to find jobs when fields lay fallow. Now they're saying "no" to donations. What happened?
Source: Lily Padula for NPR

Over the last decade and a half there's been a major push by economists to do rigorous research on poverty — basically to run experiments to figure out which solutions actually work.

But putting a halt to those that come up short is easier said than done.

Now one prominent charity is trying to set an example. It's called No Lean Season, and it's an offshoot of a larger charity called Evidence Action. No Lean Season's goal is to help rural farmhands in Bangladesh during what's called the lean season — a roughly three-month period every winter when the fields lie empty and there's no work.

And No Lean Season has decided

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from NPR

NPR4 min read
In A Decade Of Drug Overdoses, More Than 320,000 American Children Lost A Parent
New research documents how many children lost a parent to an opioid or other overdose in the period from 2011 to 2021. Bereaved children face elevated risks to their physical and emotional health.
NPR2 min readInternational Relations
Israeli Forces Take Control Of The Gaza Side Of The Rafah Crossing With Egypt
An Israeli tank brigade seized control Tuesday of the Gaza Strip side of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, authorities said, as cease-fire negotiations with Hamas remain on a knife's edge.
NPR9 min readCrime & Violence
Students And Civil Rights Groups Blast Police Response To Campus Protests
Students say they suffered broken bones, concussions and other injuries from allegedly aggressive police action breaking up pro-Palestinian protests last week.

Related Books & Audiobooks