Advocating the cause of social business, Nobel Laureate and founder of Grameen Bank Muhammad Yunus on Tuesday called for the creation of separate stock exchanges for social business entities. Unlike a profit-making business, the objective of this business should remain selfless.
Speaking on a dialogue forum on social business here, the managing director of Bangladesh-based Grameen Bank said, ?We need a separate stock market for social businesses. Profits earned from an investment in the other type of stock market should also be reinvested in social business.?
According to Yunus, the process helps generate funds for social business. Funds can also be channelised from government spending on charity. ?If the money spent in distributing free food can be sued to create a job, it is a social business. The US has trillion-dollar charity fund. In charity, money goes out and never comes back. If you use the same money in a business format, it can come back and it is social business,? he said.
Bolstering the causes of social business, his own Grameen group of companies is striving hard to emerge with new ventures. For example, Yunus Centre?a Yunus-owned Grameen group company?is in talks with Adidas for low cost shoes. ?Initially, the shoe company has agreed to send 10,000 shoes to Bangladesh on trial basis. Once successful, the price of these low-cost shoes, primarily meant for the poor, will be determined. Things are expected to materialise by September,? the father of micro-credit told FE.
Drawing fine lines between social business and profit making business, he explained, ?Social business is equally profitising. The only difference is that here there is a limit to make profit. Further, in social business the cost of production is less as compared with profit-making business wherein higher overhead costs are required to maximise profit.?
Today?s capitalism, according to the sixth most influential business thinker, is half done work. ?Capitalism is all about choices. In business there is no choice. I am offering two choices: profit making business and social business, wherein the latter is all about solving problems.?
He further urged banks across the world to disburse loan to the poor people, especially women, who actually need it. ?Banks are nobody to judge poor?s credit worthiness. The seed of poverty is not in the person but in the system. Today, two-third of the world?s population does not qualify for banking. The whole banking system is totally wrong if banks do not lend to the poor!? he exclaimed.