Dr Muhammad Yunus

KUWAIT: Women are the family’s economic backbone, said Nobel Laureate and founder of Grameen Bank Dr Mohammad Yunus late Tuesday.

During a lecture held at Kuwait Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Yunus pointed out that 99 percent of Grameen’s clients were women. His remarks came coinciding with the International Women’s Day. “Women are more committed and keen on investing and saving funds, while men tend to enjoy money, either in legitimate or illegitimate ways,” he pointed out.

The lecture is co-hosted by the Kuwaiti small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) society and the State Ministry for Youth Affairs under the theme “redesigning economics to redesign the world.”

A social entrepreneur, banker and economist, Yunus is championed in his home country of Bangladesh for pioneering the concepts of microcredit and microfinance. His microfinance organization, Grameen Bank, makes small loans to the impoverished as means of helping them cope with the rising cost of living. In 2006, Yunus was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his finance work. “The main purpose of money must be making people happy and help them get rid of poverty,” he said. —KUNA