Statement of Congressman Rush Holt
Mr. Speaker, for centuries, we have lauded the achievements of great entrepreneurs, whether the automobile industry of Henry Ford or the iPhone of Steve Jobs. Business was the province of people with money. As the old cynical joke goes, banks would loan money only to people who don't need it.
So throughout the world, and especially in the post-colonial developing world, the chance of escaping poverty and living a dignified life seemed an impossible dream for millions and millions. One person has helped transform the dream into a possibility--in fact, a reality--of family sufficiency for people all over the planet.
When the Nobel Committee awarded Dr. Muhammad Yunus and the financial institution he created, the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, the Nobel Peace Prize a few years back, the Committee made the award for ``their efforts to create economic and social development from below.'' I'll phrase it differently. Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank received the award for treating people with dignity and giving millions around the world hope.
Today, in the rotunda here at the U.S. Capitol, we honor Dr. Yunus with the Congressional Gold Medal. Muhammad Yunus has shown us being a visionary does not mean promoting the impractical or the impossible. Unlike some economic theories advanced over centuries, Dr. Yunus' theories have been proven to work. To date, the Grameen Foundation and the bank and its partners have helped 9.4 million of the world's poorest people receive microloans. The bank has given loans of a few dollars to millions to those who, by traditional standards, are not worthy of credit.
His idea of a socially conscious business focused on serving the poor flew in the face of conventional economic theory and certainly in the face of existing banking practice. But it worked. Recipients paid back the loans and got ahead financially.
The Grameen Foundation's financial outreach to people living below the poverty level has been life-altering for women in Nigeria and Haiti and Cambodia and Peru. Dr. Yunus has inspired similar local efforts in dozens of nations, including our own. His life and work are a testament to the difference a single person can make here on Earth.
Dr. Yunus' legacy will be measured not simply by the many awards he has won over his career, such as we honor him with today, but by the current and future generations of people who will travel the road from poverty to success and sufficiency because of Dr. Yunus' vision and commitment. He believes that we have the power to end poverty--not just to alleviate it, but end it--and we should take him seriously. Muhammad Yunus is showing us how.
I ask my colleagues to join me in giving Dr. Yunus congratulations on receiving the Congressional Gold Medal today, and join me in giving thanks to him for making many, many lives around the world better.
Source: capitolwords
