Grameen Circus

Ms. Sufia Begum- who inspired the Grameen concept spinning her heirloom wheel

(A Real Time Bangladesh Blog Report, March 2011)

The recent dramatized ouster of Dr. Yunus from Grameen Bank- has stirred quite a bit of media storm about the Nobel Lauriat founder and the Bank. Many articles- naturally mix personal issues concerning the founder with the issues of microcredit. A key question is- Does microcredit help the poor of Bangladesh? Indeed, there are also assertions that it hurts!

Does Microcredit Reduce Poverty?

(A Real Time Bangladesh Blog Report, March 2011)

This blog summarize the finding of a seminal paper ‘Khandker Study’- possibly the most cited paper on the topic- titled Fighting Poverty With Microcredit : Experience in Bangladesh by Khandker and Shahidur Rahman, Publisher : World Bank, ISBN no : 019521121. This is a 100+ page paper. Here I will try to quote the highlights. The study indeed claims it works!