BARD has undertaken experimental projects to evolve models for improved institutions, administrative structures, coordination and methods of production. The project activities usually involve the villagers, village institutions, local councils and government officials. So far the Academy has conducted about 50 experimental projects on various aspects of rural development. Out of these pilot experimentations it has been able to evolve the following rural development models that replicated throughout the country,

From the early sixties, the Academy evolved a new system of rural cooperatives. The small farmers of the Comilla Sadar Upazila (lowest administrative unit) were organised into primary cooperatives. Much emphasis was given on member’s training, regular weekly meetings and small deposits as well as adoption of new technologies like HYV seed, fertilizer, irrigation, etc. The village based primary cooperatives were federated at the Upazila level and the federation was called Upazila Central Cooperatives Association (UCCA). This UCCA supported to provide training and credit support to the village level primary cooperatives and to undertake ventures like storage, processing, marketing, mechanization, etc. This two-tier cooperative system was found viable and adopted by

Upazila (presently Upazila) Training and Development Centre (UTDC) was designed as a model of decentralized and coordinated rural administration for the sake of development. It aims at ensuring effective coordination between the nation-building departments and organizations of the rural people (local councils, cooperatives, etc) as a .... secretariat of the government. The people and the Government were the partners of development and the UTDC provided the institutional mechanism to promote this partnership. The Upazila level officers of various departments had been brought in one centre for that purpose and all the necessary services and inputs were also made available in the same centre. The departmental experts were assigned to become facilitators and trainers of the people. Thus within a few years of theestablishment of UTDC, the Upazila Centre had turned into a hub of training, planning, coordination and service. Replication of UTDC in phases throughout the country was accepted as a program by the Government in 1963 and gradually replicated in all the Upazilas. UTDC was used as the base for introducing the decentralized administration system under the Upazila Parishad in 1982.

            In Bangladesh, the period from December to March normally remains dry. In absence of irrigation arrangement no agricultural operation can be taken up during this period even though water remains available in the canals, rivers and underground. The simple operation of lifting the surface and underground water and channeling it through canals remained unrealized due to lack of technology and appropriate organization. Academy’s experiment in its laboratory area (Comilla Sadar Upazila) to use surface water through low lift pumps and underground water through deep tubewells with the management of village cooperatives led to a new variety of rice cultivation (Boro) during this period.  Since the implementation of the experimental programme as well as the operation of the irrigation technology requires collaborative efforts of co-operators and Upazila level officers, a new institutional arrangement emerged which came to be known as the Thana Irrigation Programme (TIP). By 1969, this became a countrywide programme. The present coverage of more than 3.8 million hectares under irrigation through water lifting pumps, deep and shallow tube wells is mainly the contribution of TIP.  Over the years the expansion of minor irrigation programme was done through the Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation (BADC) and BRDB.

The Academy undertook project experimentation of family planning in the early 1960s through village cooperatives. Village women, nominated by the cooperatives, used to work as family planning agents and distributed contraceptives. Publicity on family planning through folk songs in the market centres and suitable locations was introduced. The family planning programme launched by Government in 1965 was more or less based on the results of experiments of BARD at Comilla.

         The four basic programmes discussed above (Cooperatives, TTDC, RWP and TIP) which are integrated in nature produced the maximum result when undertaken in a coordinated manner. All the above components taken together constituted a model of rural development, which is popularly known as the ‘Comilla Approaxh to Rural Development (Comilla Model)’. Cooperatives organised the people, RWP protected their land from flood, provided drainage facilities while TIP helped the use of water resources for irrigation during the dry season and TTDC coordinated the development activities, trained the villagers to develop their skill and provided services and supplies. The four components were inter-linked and mutually re-inforcing. The concept of ‘Integrated Rural Development (IRD)’ was evolved and took a concrete shape in this country through the research and experimentation activities of BARD.