Nobel prize winner Muhammad Yunus said Thursday that microfinance could help disaster-struck Japan rebuild, even though the concept he pioneered is usually associated with poor and developing nations. Yunus, seen as one of the world's leading anti-poverty activists, said extending small loans could help people in regions devastated by last year's quake-tsunami disaster, despite Japan being one of Asia's richest countries.
"It's needed everywhere - it doesn't matter where you are," the Bangladeshi Nobel laureate told the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. "When you come to a disaster area like Tohoku (in north-east Japan), it's all the more important... You have to rebuild everything all over again. There's no house, there's nothing."
About 19,000 people died or remain missing after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake off Japan's north-eastern coast triggered a giant tsunami on March 11 last year. Many had to evacuate communities near the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, leaving thousands without jobs or homes. "You used to have a job. Now you have no job because of the disaster. Can I create my own job? Self-employment," Yunus said, citing the benefits of small microfinance loans.