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Background: In 2019, the World Health Organization identified improving access to safe abortion as an important priority toward improving sexual and reproductive health and rights and achieving Sustainable Development Goals. One strategy for addressing this priority is strengthening access to medicines for medical abortion. All 11 countries in the South-East Asia Region have some indications for legal abortion and permit post-abortion care. Therefore, strengthening access to medical abortion medicines is a reasonable strategy for improving access to safe abortion for the Region. Methodology: We applied an adapted version of an existing World Health Organization landscape assessment protocol for the availability of medical abortion medicines at the country-level in the South-East Asia Region. We collected publicly available data on the existence of national health laws, policies, and standard treatment guidelines; inclusion of medical abortion medicines in the national essential medicines list; and marketing authorization status for medical abortion medicines for each country and verified by Ministries of health. The findings were once more presented, discussed and recommendations were formulated during regional technical consultation workshop. Each country teams participated in the process, and subsequently, the suggestions were validated by representatives from Ministries of Health.. Results: Few countries in the Region currently have national policies and guidelines for comprehensive safe abortion. However, either mifepristone-misoprostol in combination or misoprostol alone (for other indications) is included in national essential medicines lists in all countries except Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Few countries earmark specific public funds for procuring and distributing medical abortion commodities. In countries where abortion is legal, the private sector and NGOs support access to medical abortion information and medicines. Several countries only allow registered medical practitioners or specialists to administer medical abortion. Conclusion: Following this rapid participatory assessment and technical consultation workshop, the World Health Organization South-East Asia Regional Technical Advisory and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights technical committee recommended priority actions for policy and advocacy, service delivery, and monitoring and evaluation, and indicated areas for support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents, assessment of cost-benefit parameters of conservation agricultural machinery for custom hires entrepreneurship development in the southern region of Bangladesh. The key principles of the study were to determine the economic parameters for developing a conservation agriculture (CA) machine custom hire entrepreneurship and effective schedules for CA machine operation. Field experiments were conducted at Dumuria, Wazirpur, Subarnachar and Kolapara Upazila (Sub-district) of Khulna, Barishal, Noakhali and Patuakhali districts, respectively in the southern region of Bangladesh in the years 2017 and 2018. Two villages in each Upazila were selected for this study. Primary data was collected from these field experiments. Secondary data from various sources were used in this section of research. Annual operating costs were calculated, and project financial profitability was determined by four on farm financial measurement techniques namely, benefit-cost ratio (BCR), net present value (NPV), internal rate of return (IRR), payback period (PBP). The total cost of operation of a CA machine was found US$32 per hectare. Annual savings for replacement and a profit margin for the entrepreneur, the rent-out charge of the CA machine was estimated at US$82 per hectare of machine operation. Considering 15% interest rate, the NPV of CA machine in exiting condition was US$683. The NPV indicates that CA machinery is considered financially sound and the project is said financially viable because IRR (39%) of CA machine was greater that the bank interest rate (14%). The benefit-cost ratio of machine was found 1.10, which was a profitable venture for an entrepreneur. The break-even use of the CA machine was estimated 3.12 ha of machine operation. Therefore, the owners of CA machine or local service providers (LSPs) can start this business right now which will be highly profitable venture for an entrepreneur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]