Large‐scale QRPA calculations of the E1‐strength are performed on top of HFB calculations in order to derive the radiative neutron capture cross sections for the whole nuclear chart. The spreading width of the GDR is taken into account by analogy with the second‐RPA (SRPA) method. It is shown that the present model allows to constrain the effective nucleon‐nucleon interaction with the GDR data and to provide quantitative predictions of dipole strengths. © 2004 American Institute of Physics