Muhammad Yunus
Muhammad Yunus
Muhammad Yunusis a Bangladeshi social entrepreneur, banker, economist, and civil society leader who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for founding the Grameen Bank and pioneering the concepts of microcredit and microfinance. These loans are given to entrepreneurs too poor to qualify for traditional bank loans. In 2006, Yunus and the Grameen Bank were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for their efforts through microcredit to create economic and social development from below". The Norwegian Nobel Committee said that "lasting...
ProfessionEntrepreneur
Date of Birth28 June 1940
CityChittagong, Bangladesh
beings chance human knew unleash
All human beings are born entrepreneurs. Some get a chance to unleash that capacity. Some never got the chance, never knew that he or she has that capacity.
absence basic conflict future human life nations peace
I said peace is sometimes narrowly interpreted; it's the absence of conflict between nations or something. But peace is more inherent, more basic to human life, human beings, what we feel about each other, what we feel about life around us and what we see in our future.
change greatest instructed mindset strange tricks
My greatest challenge has been to change the mindset of people. Mindsets play strange tricks on us. We see things the way our minds have instructed our eyes to see.
civilization enormous environmental given single technology took
Civilization has given us enormous successes: going to the moon, technology. But then this is the civilisation that took us to debt, environmental crisis, every single crisis. We need a civilization where we say goodbye to these things.
crisis economic envision flaws free happened imagine life overcome social society
To overcome poverty and the flaws of the economic crisis in our society, we need to envision our social life. We have to free our mind, imagine what has never happened before and write social fiction. We need to imagine things to make them happen. If you don't imagine, it will never happen.
business companies core create emerging enable engage impact knowledge model simply social society strengths
By simply capitalizing on core strengths and knowledge, companies and entrepreneurs can engage in an emerging business model that will enable them to create - and demonstrate - real, sustainable social impact in society.
bank benefit borrowers brought changed family four gave high million money policy priority saw soon women
Soon we saw that money going to women brought much more benefit to the family than money going to the men. So we changed our policy and gave a high priority to women. As a result, now 96% of our four million borrowers in Grameen Bank are women.
business call company dedicated dismiss forgetting human people personal profit social solving stays
I dismiss personal profit and focus exclusively on people and planet. That's what I call social business: a nondividend company dedicated to solving human problems. You can go all the way, forgetting about personal profit, being single-minded about solving problems. The company makes profit, but profit stays with the company.
business collective interest mechanism money satisfies selfish solve
Business is a very beautiful mechanism to solve problems, but we never use it for that purpose. We only use it to make money. It satisfies our selfish interest but not our collective interest.
beings creative expand express full human level money next reach
All human beings are very creative - full of potential, full of energy... So, money kind of allows them to express it... And if you're successful, you can take more money. You can expand your capacity, reach next level of capacity, and so on.
affordable health means provided services tools truly
Truly affordable but high-quality health care tools and services are the only means by which quality health care can be provided to all.
billion finance half loan population qualify six systems three
Today, if you look at financial systems around the globe, more than half the population of the world - out of six billion people, more than three billion - do not qualify to take out a loan from a bank. This is a shame.
access education far grew reach village
Access to quality education has enabled me to reach far beyond the Bangladeshi village I grew up in.
affordable business common create food good healthy joint people prices social trying unhealthy venture
What we are trying to do is to create a social business in Bangladesh, a joint venture to create restaurants for common people. Good, healthy food at affordable prices so that people don't have to opt for food that is unhealthy and unhygienic.