SolarWorld AG bestowed the 2010 SolarWorld Einstein Award upon the Nobel Peace Prize winner and founder of the Grameen Bank Prof Muhammad Yunus

SolarWorld AG bestowed the 2010 SolarWorld Einstein Award upon the Nobel Peace Prize winner and founder of the Grameen Bank Prof. Muhammad Yunus at a presentation event in Valencia, Spain. The professor of economics from Bangladesh is thus being honored for his break-through concept of micro-credits for the poor, with the help of which millions of people worldwide managed the jump from poverty to self-sufficiency.

'Grameen has given me an unshakeable faith in human creativity and the firm belief that human beings are not born to suffer the misery of hunger and poverty,' declared Prof. Muhammad Yunus in his ceremonial address. Micro-credits have so far made possible among many other things the installation of more than 400,000 small solar power systems that ensure the energy supply to people in rural regions of Bangladesh that are far from the national grid.

by Sneh Duggal

Dr. Muhammad Yunus is an advocate of "social businesses" -- companies that address problems such as malnutrition, drug addiction or unemployment.

Social business has a role in Canadian society, said Yunus, who received an honorary law doctorate from Carleton University on Wednesday.

"Social business is not for some African countries having lots of difficulties, it's wherever those difficulties exist," he said. "Whether it's in Canada or the U.S., African countries or Bangladesh, we bring our creative minds to create a social business to solve it." A social business is not a charity, but not a profit-making venture either. Investors are entitled to retrieve only their initial investment. Any profits are reinvested, allowing the business to be self-sufficient.

Despite the multi-stop fleeting Atlanta visit, it was heartwarming to learn that the ‘Banker to the Poor' had accepted the last minute invite and agreed to make a presentation at Atlanta Indian's vintage umbrella organization viz. the India American Cultural Organization (IACA). A diverse cross-section of Indian-American communities gave a red carpet welcome to the visiting Nobel Laureate on Saturday, August 28, 2010. The event hosted by IACA was co-sponsored by the Gandhi Foundation of USA, Pujari and Bengali Association of Greater Atlanta.It is notable that GFUSA was the first non-profit Organization to step up to co-sponsor the event.

Nobel Winner Yunus Speaks at Tech

By Yeameen Huq, Contributing Writer

The IMPACT Speaker Series kicked off on Aug. 26, 2010 with a presentation by Muhammad Yunus, the social activist and economist who started the Grameen Foundation and won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize.

Having recently authored his third bestseller, Building Social Business: The New Kind of Capitalism that Serves Humanity's Most Pressing Needs, Yunus gave a presentation at the LeCraw Auditorium in the College of Management building and an overview on what people can do to design a new system that is both self-sufficient and beneficial to society.

The IMPACT Speaker Series has worked since 2002 to bring major business leaders from various industries to help give advice to students in areas ranging from leadership to entrepreneurship and even philanthropy. Working with the Bangladesh Student Association, the series booked Yunus this month to give advice on building sustainable philanthropy based on his own personal successes.

Yunus' lecture primarily consisted of speeches, anecdotes and business experiences, eschewing a PowerPoint in favor of a more casual approach. He began by talking about his early life as an economist who studied on a Fulbright Scholarship at Vanderbilt University. He then worked as a professor in Bangladesh, until he believed that the standard economic theories he taught were not relevant to the poverty that was around him."[Economists] believe all human beings care about is money. People suffer so much for so little money," Yunus said.