Schirmherrschaft
**Schirmherr des Studentenwettbewerbs impACT³ ist Prof.
Muhammad Yunus**
Lesen Sie hier sein Grußwort an die Teilnehmer in englischer Sprache:
Patronage of the pan-European student competition impACT³ is granted by Prof. Muhammad Yunus
I can’t tell you how important I think initiatives such as impACT³ are. We must first spread the belief that poverty can change, that individuals can better society, but we must also always be thinking about all the ways that can happen. Your initiative to take part in this competition is designed to do just that.
I don’t know how many of you are familiar with my work or how it started. In 1974-75 there was a famine in Bangladesh. I was an economics professor at the time at Chittagong University in southern Bangladesh. As a watched the disaster that unfolded around me I realized that the economic theories I was teaching in the classroom bore no relationship to the poverty that surrounded me.
I decided to go to a poor village to try to get closer to the problem, to understand it. What I found were people working desperately hard simply to survive. They had no opportunity to save, no opportunity to change their circumstances. Working ones way out of poverty was simply not a possibility.
Ultimately I acted as a lender of a total of $27 loan for 42 villagers – a miniscule amount, but one that granted them a chance. That turned into the Grameen Bank, an institution that lends collateral free money to poor women with the goal to foster entrepreneurship. Just like the money you receive today, the amounts were small, but the outcome was huge. 8 million woman have now received loans from Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. While their parents are 100 % illiterate, 100% of the second generation of Grameen borrowers is literate. That means there is a new generation of women making their own living, and children who will have much greater opportunities.
After Grameen Bank, I set up many more businesses in sectors ranging from healthcare to energy to education. They were experiments to start – some failed and others took numerous fits and starts. None of it was easy or clear-cut but now, after 20 years, we have 25 successful business using 25 different business models with the common link that each designed to improve the lives of the poor.
Most recently, I have started collaborating with some of the world’s leading corporations, Danone, Veolia, Intel, and BASF, to set up joint social businesses. These again were experiments. Who would have thought that huge profit-driven companies would set up business for the poor with no goal of profit, but a simple goal to better society? Five years ago I would never have thought that such a thing could happen and now it has, four times over. Many more are coming.
One of the things that I have learned is that one must not be an expert in a sector to make a difference. If I had been a banker, most likely I would never have thought to start a bank to lend to the poor with no collateral. As a banker, I would already have been trained to work within the existing systems, to believe that an entirely new model was not possible. But as an observer, I could ignore all the rules and simply see the need. I was, in essence, able to create my own solution to address the reality.
I believe that is your challenge today. It does not matter what sector you focus on or what location – it must simply be that what moves you. Use your instincts - you are young, bright and driven individuals. Some of the businesses you begin to create today will most certainly survive, some may create new models that will be considered as revolutionary. It may be small today but it may eventually become universal. Some may fail, but you’ll be planting a seed that will move you and others in the future.
I would leave you with one final piece of advice: Look for the needs and see them with an open mind. Do your very best to forget the rules and limitations that society has taught you. I firmly believe that realities can and should change – and that each of you has the ability to make that happen.
I wish you all immense success in your undertakings. I hope that this experience will help you take the concept of social business and spread it – to your friends, your families, your colleagues, and, most importantly, in your own life, wherever your future may take you.
Do it with joy!
Prof. Muhammad Yunus
Hier können Sie das englischsprachige Grußwort herunterladen.
