A BIOGRAPHY OF MUHAMMAD YUNUS
Muhammad Yunus (born June 28, 1940) is a Nobel Peace Prize-winning Bangladeshi social entrepreneur, banker, economist, and civil society leader who founded the Grameen Bank and pioneered the concepts of microcredit and microfinance. These loans are granted to entrepreneurs that are unable to get standard bank loans due to their financial situation. The Nobel Peace Prize was shared by Yunus and the Grameen Bank “for their efforts through microcredit to achieve economic and social development from below.”

The Norwegian Nobel Committee stated that “lasting peace cannot be achieved unless large populations groups find ways to escape poverty” and that “across cultures and civilizations, Yunus and Grameen Bank have demonstrated that even the poorest of the poor can work to bring about their own development.”

He has also garnered several national and international awards. He was awarded the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2010.He was ranked second on Foreign Policy magazine’s list of the “Top 100 Global Thinkers” in 2008.

Muhammad Yunus, SaskiaBruysten, Sophie Eisenmann, and Hans Reitz co-founded Yunus Social Business – Global Initiatives (YSB) in February 2011. YSB develops and enables social companies to confront and solve global social issues. YSB maintains incubation funds for social firms in poor countries and provides consultancy services to corporations, governments, foundations, and NGOs as the international implementation arm for Yunus’ vision of a new, compassionate capitalism.

He became Chancellor of Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland in 2012, and he retained that role until 2018. He was previously an economics professor at Chittagong University in Bangladesh. He wrote numerous books on his finance career. He is a founding board member of the microcredit organizations Grameen America and Grameen Foundation.

Yunus is also a member of the board of directors of the United Nations Foundation, a public foundation established in 1998 with a $1 billion grant from American entrepreneur Ted Turner to assist UN projects.