Bangladesh Nobel Peace Prize winner and microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus on Thursday pledged to "put poverty in the museum" as he opened a summit promoting his idea of "social business". "This summit is a kind of breath of fresh air. All the gloom and doom in the world, we want to get out of that," Yunus, 72, said at the three-day event in Vienna.
"Nobody has to suffer from the indignity of poverty. We are saying that we can put poverty in the museum.... We want to do things that can make it happen, and this is what this summit is all about." Social business aims to create firms offering goods and services at affordable prices, while giving poor and marginalised people ownership in the businesses.
The firms are however managed in a "traditional" manner, with employees paid according to market rates. Once the initial start-up capital is repaid, the companies aim to be financially self-sufficient, and all profits are reinvested in the business. The concept follows the groundbreaking work in microcredits by Yunus's Grameen Bank, created in 1976, which offered the very poor small loans to set up businesses.
As an example of "social businesses," organisers cited Bonergie, founded in Germany in 2009 and offering solar power equipment in Senegal that people buy using microcredits. Yunus and Grameen Bank were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. Yunus however left the institution last year, due to what his supporters called a government vendetta against him. The Vienna summit, the fourth of its kind, includes around 500 participants from more than 50 nations from the worlds of business, politics and academia, with Queen Sofia of Spain giving one of the opening speeches.
Comments
Comments are closed.