Well folks! You can't get much more high profile than this. I wonder why he hasn't been mentioned or quoted so much before. I have mentioned him before but for some reason people didn't seem so enthusiastic about praising him. Funny that . . . oh well, here's a lot more information.

SPREAD THE WORD TO YOUR NON TC FRIENDS

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2006/yunus-bio.html
excerpts:
From Dr. Yunus' personal loan of small amounts of money to destitute basketweavers in Bangladesh in the mid-70s, the Grameen Bank has advanced to the forefront of a burgeoning world movement toward eradicating poverty through microlending. Replicas of the Grameen Bank model operate in more than 100 countries worldwide.
. . .
From 1993 to 1995, Professor Yunus was a member of the International Advisory Group for the Fourth World Conference on Women, a post to which he was appointed by the UN secretary general. He has served on the Global Commission of Women's Health, the Advisory Council for Sustainable Economic Development and the UN Expert Group on Women and Finance.

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2006/yunus-lecture-en.html
excerpts:
Nine elected representatives of the 7 million borrowers-cum-owners of Grameen Bank have accompanied me all the way to Oslo to receive the prize. I express thanks on their behalf to the Norwegian Nobel Committee for choosing Grameen Bank for this year's Nobel Peace Prize. By giving their institution the most prestigious prize in the world, you give them unparalleled honour. Thanks to your prize, nine proud women from the villages of Bangladesh are at the ceremony today as Nobel laureates, giving an altogether new meaning to the Nobel Peace Prize.
. . .
This years' prize gives highest honour and dignity to the hundreds of millions of women all around the world who struggle every day to make a living and bring hope for a better life for their children. This is a historic moment for them.
. . .
Peace should be understood in a human way − in a broad social, political and economic way. Peace is threatened by unjust economic, social and political order, absence of democracy, environmental degradation and absence of human rights.
http://www.muhammadyunus.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammad_Yunus#Political_activity

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2006/yunus-interview.html 15 minute video
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2006/yunus-docu.html 10 minute film

From what i know about it at the time,his Bank idea wasnt highly appreciated from other banks or bankers as well,for very obvious reasons.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/6047234.stm

excerpt:

"His revolutionary Grameen (Village) banking system is estimated to have extended credit to more than seven million of the world's poor, most of them in Bangladesh, one of the poorest nations in the world.

The vast majority of the beneficiaries are women."

In one of the other links I gave it mentioned over 90% of the loans are given to women, because the women are more likely to spend the money on their families.

excerpt:

" Last Updated: Friday, 13 October 2006, 14:13 GMT 15:13 UK

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Profile: 'World banker to the poor'

Muhammad Yunus was "really delighted" by the award
Muhammad Yunus is often referred to as "the world's banker to the poor". His life's work has been to prove that the poor are credit-worthy.
His revolutionary Grameen (Village) banking system is estimated to have extended credit to more than seven million of the world's poor, most of them in Bangladesh, one of the poorest nations in the world.

The vast majority of the beneficiaries are women.

Mr Yunus came up with the idea in 1976 while professor of economics at Chittagong University in southern Bangladesh.

The first loans he issued had a value of $27 (£14.5. Their recipients were 42 women from the village of Jobra, near the university.

The women had relied until then on local money-lenders who charged high interest rates. The conventional banking system had been reluctant to give credit to those who were too poor to provide any form of guarantee.


The success of Mr Yunus' scheme exceeded all expectations and has been copied in developing countries around the world.


His "micro-finance" initiative reaches out to people shunned by conventional banking systems - people so poor they have no collateral to guarantee a loan, should they be unable to repay it.


Mr Yunus' has tried to tranform the vicious circle of "low-income, low saving and low investment" into a virtuous circle of "low income, injection of credit, investment, more income, more savings, more investment, more income".

As a result, even beggars have been able to borrow money under his scheme.

Legacy of change


The BBC's Roland Buerk in Dhaka says that Mr Yunus lives a simple life. The Grameen Bank is now majority owned by the rural poor it serves, with a 10% stake held by the Bangladeshi government.


Even beggars can get Grameen loans

Our correspondent says that Mr Yunus has already created a legacy of real social change in Bangladesh.




His work has been widely recognised. In 1999 he was awarded the Indira Gandhi prize for peace, disarmament and development in India.


And it is not just in the developing world that he has had an impact.

Hillary Clinton, wife of former US President Bill Clinton, said in 2000 that Mr Yunus had helped the Clintons introduce micro-credit schemes to some of the poorest communities in Arkansas.


In 2002 a report in the Wall Street Journal said the bank was running into trouble because of increased competition and a fall in the bank's loan repayment rate.

Mr Yunus responded by telling the BBC that the bank was in its "strongest position ever".


"Micro-credit is something which is not going to disappear... because this is a need of the people," he said.

"Whatever name you give it, you have to have those financial facilities coming to them because it is totally unfair... to deny half the population of the world financial services."

Now Mr Yunus hopes that the Nobel peace prize will provide a huge boost to Grameen.

"It's recognition of our movement to ensure the rights of the poor," he told the BBC's Bengali service.

"With this recognition, we expect that the model we have developed will spread across the world." "


This scheme allows the poor to make a life for themselves without having to rely on charity. A great boost for their self esteem and self worth.

99% of loans, given without collaterall, are repaid.

I want to congratulate Muhammad Yunus for his valuable works about women. good stuff...

He's fully deserved that price..

A Banker for the Poor

Seeking to understand the reality of the economics of the daily life of the poor, he set out to learn from the nearby villagers. Eventually, out of his own pocket, he loaned the equivalent of $27 to 42 women so that they could buy materials to make and sell stools. These tiny loans helped them break the devastating cycle of poverty and demonstrated to Yunus the power of “micro-credit” and self-employment in helping poor people generate income. Recognizing that the existing banking system was designed to “keep poor people out” and, in his world, “reject women,” Yunus had taken his first concrete step towards becoming the “Banker to the Poor.” He soon established the Grameen Bank, a revolutionary financial institution that extends small loans for income generation to the poor. Grameen does not rely on collateral, long-term loans, lump-sum repayments, and legal agreements, but rather on peer lending groups, one-year loans, weekly installments, and trust and faith in the human potential.

Yunus ended his presentation with a challenge: "How easy it is for us to underestimate people and their resolve. If you could get over that and believe in the potential of human beings, and design everything with that as the basis, we would have a world without any poor people and poverty truly would be in the poverty museum, no where else in the world."

Well I thought I would experiment with this thread and what I thought would happen did.


Start a thread which gives certain members what they have been demanding . . . a positive image of a Muslim. Actually a Muslim man who makes it his business to help women in poverty. A Muslim dedicated to world peace amongst other things. A Muslim who, by invitation has became a member of a select group of elder thinkers that includes Nelson Mandella.

So where are these members? Nothing positive to say about this man? What a shame. I guess there wasn't a genuine interest then.