Transnational Cross-Border Family Ties: Diasporic Lives of Bangladeshis in Italy and Beyond

The scope of this paper is to gain a better understanding of how Bangladeshi migrants in Italy maintain transnational family attachments, across multiple destinations, with the home country as well as with several host countries. The data comes from fieldwork in Northeast Italy. Research methods include in-depth interviews and participant observation. The findings reveal that a high proportion of Bangladeshi migrants maintain a variety of transnational and diasporic ties with their family and friends living in the country of origin and different European countries. These include family obligations, remittances, establishing businesses back home, visits and communication. They also preserve their national identity in this host society by maintaining cultural ways of belonging and through religious practices and involvement in Bangladeshi politics. The findings have also shown that Italian Bangladeshi families work to foster transnational family ties among the new generations born in Italy, who have little knowledge of their ancestral country. On a final note, this paper argues that transnational connections with the homeland play an important role in shaping the diasporic lives of Bangladeshis in Italy.

DISSEMINATING AN AUTOMATED IRRIGATION SYSTEM USING SOLAR ENERGY IN PERSPECTIVE OF BANGLADESH

Bangladesh is mainly an agricultural country. Agriculture is the most important occupation for the most of the Bangladeshi families. This study is conducted to develop an automated irrigation mechanism which turns the pumping motor ON and OFF by detecting the moisture content of the earth using the soil moisture sensor without the intervention of human. This Smart irrigation system project is using an Arduino Uno micro-controller, Solar Panel, Battery, Boost module, Relay Module, Soil Moisture Sensor, DC Motor etc. Arduino Uno that is programmed to collect the input signal according to moisture content of the soil and its output is given to the op-amp that will operate the pump. The benefit of employing this technique is to decrease human interference and it is quite feasible and affordable.

Italian-Bangladeshis in London: Onward Migration and Its Effects on Their Linguistic Repertoire

This article discussed language use and language maintenance among the Italian-Bangladeshi community in London, considering in particular the effects of onward migration on the reorganisation of their linguistic repertoire. Drawing on focus groups and interviews with the second-generation members of Italian-Bangladeshi families, initial findings revealed that Italian is maintained through communication with same-age friends and siblings, with older siblings acting as the main agents of language maintenance. English is considered the most important language and, together with a British education, functions as a pull-factor for onward migration to improve the second generation’s future prospects. Bengali, on the other hand, is spoken by parents among themselves and children are not always fluent in the language. Bengali also represents a marker of identity for the Italian-Bangladeshi community as opposed to the larger Sylheti-speaking British-Bangladeshi community.

Cultural adaptation of an existing children’s weight management programme: the CHANGE intervention and feasibility RCT

BackgroundExcess weight in children is a continuing health issue. Community-based children’s weight management programmes have had some effect in promoting weight loss. Families from minority ethnic communities are less likely to complete these programmes but, to date, no programmes have been culturally adapted to address this.ObjectivesWe aimed to (1) culturally adapt an existing weight management programme for children aged 4–11 years and their families to make it more suited to Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities but inclusive of all families and (2) evaluate the adapted programme to assess its feasibility and acceptability, as well as the feasibility of methods, for a future full-scale trial.DesignIn phase I, a cultural adaptation of a programme that was informed by formative research and guided by two theoretical frameworks was undertaken and in phase II this adapted programme was delivered in a cluster-randomised feasibility study (for which the clusters were the standard and adapted children’s weight management programmes).SettingBirmingham: a large, ethnically diverse UK city.ParticipantsIn phase I, Pakistani and Bangladeshi parents of children with excess weight, and, in phase II, children aged 4–11 years who have excess weight and their families.InterventionsA culturally adapted children’s weight management programme, comprising six sessions, which was delivered to children and parents, targeting diet and physical activity and incorporating behaviour change techniques, was developed in phase I and delivered in the intervention arm to 16 groups in phase II. The eight groups in the comparator arm received the standard (unadapted) children’s weight management programme.Main outcome measuresThe primary outcome was the proportion of Pakistani and Bangladeshi families completing (attending ≥ 60% of) the adapted programme. Secondary outcomes included the proportion of all families completing the adapted programme, the feasibility of delivery of the programme, the programme’s acceptability to participants, the feasibility of trial processes and the feasibility of collection of outcome and cost data.ResultsThe proportion of Pakistani and Bangladeshi families and all families completing the adapted programme was 78.8% [95% confidence interval (CI) 64.8% to 88.2%] and 76.3% (95% CI 67.0% to 83.6%), respectively. The programme was feasible to deliver with some refinements and was well received. Ninety-two families participated in outcome data collection. Data collection was mostly feasible, but participant burden was high. Data collection on the cost of programme delivery was feasible, but costs to families were more challenging to capture. There was high attrition over the 6-month follow-up period (35%) and differential attrition in the two study arms (29% and 52% in the intervention and comparator arms, respectively).LimitationsThe study was not designed to address the issue of low participant uptake of children’s weight management programmes. The design of a future trial may include individual randomisation and a ‘minimal intervention’ arm, the acceptability of which has not been evaluated in this study.ConclusionsThe theoretically informed, culturally adapted children’s weight management programme was highly acceptable to children and families of all ethnicities. Consideration should be given to a future trial to evaluate clinical effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of the adapted programme, but the design of a future trial would need to address the logistics of data collection, participant burden and study attrition.Trial registrationCurrent Controlled Trials ISRCTN81798055.FundingThis project was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Technology Assessment programme and will be published in full inHealth Technology Assessment; Vol. 23, No. 33. See the NIHR Journals Library website for further project information. Kate Jolly is part-funded by the Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care West Midlands.

Ambivalent Mobilities and Survival Strategies of Moroccan and Bangladeshi Families in Italy in Times of Crisis

This article investigates the link between the economic crisis and migrant family reunification with a focus on mobility strategies of reunited families. Drawing on in-depth interviews with Moroccan and Bangladeshi families, carried out in the Metropolitan City of Venice, between 2012 and 2016, the article aims to show the complex process of further separation that reunified families endure in order to deal with the consequences of the crisis. Family unity does not represent a definitive and lasting achievement. Rather, it is a status that must be constantly protected in order to fulfil the requirements imposed by reunification policies. Migrant families must undertake various forms of mobility to maintain their housing, occupational and economic standards and sometimes may move to other countries to preserve their unity. In response to the crisis, migrants appropriate the instruments of citizenship in order to increase their mobility capital and the opportunity to stay in Europe.

Estimation of Loss of Iodine from Edible Iodized Salt During Cooking of Various Bangladeshi Food Preparations

Iodine is one of the essential micronutrients required for the normal mental and physical development of human beings. Low iodine intake exerts several detrimental effects on human health. The most serious effect of iodine deficiency is represented by possible damage to the fetus such as stillbirths, abortions and congenital abnormalities. According to the existing law, iodized salt should contain at least 15 ppm of iodine. However, iodine is lost significantly during cooking and few studies have been conducted to estimate such loss of iodine. Hence, in the present study, thirty recipes commonly cooked in Bangladeshi families were taken and by using colorimetric assay method, it was found that the mean losses of iodine during different cooking procedures were 13.28% for pressure cooking, 23.46% for boiling, 9.5% for deep frying and 5.18% for shallow frying. The results showed that the loss of iodine depends upon the type of cooking procedures and cooking time.Dhaka Univ. J. Pharm. Sci. 15(2): 161-165, 2016 (December)