UNB, Dhaka – The Daily Star – Sunday October 12, 2008
Nobel laureate micro-finance pioneer Professor Muhammad Yunus has defined the American monetary system crash as ‘financial tsunami in Wall Street casino’ and advised preparing for facing the waves of adverse impacts sent across the globe.
He made the wake-up call in the inaugural session of a two-day seminar on ‘Rethinking Poverty Eradication in South Asia: An Agenda for Inclusive Development’.
Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) hosted the seminar to discuss the first draft of the study on the same topic prepared by the CPD as part of its joint-work programme with the South Asia Centre for Policy Studies (SACEPS) at Brac Centre Inn.
Commerce Adviser Hossain Zillur Rahman and Professor Yunus attended the seminar as special guests.
Chairperson of the Institute of Integrated Development Studies (IIDS), Kathmandu, and SACEPS board member Dr Mohanman Sainju chaired the inaugural session where Professor Rehman Sobhan made his maiden power-point presentation.
Professor Yunus noted that the world economy is in a crisis now, which generated in the US a financial system crash but engulfed the world economy.
“The financial crisis will hit us soon and the poorest people will suffer the most. I hope we are prepared to face the heat,” said the Nobel Peace Prize winner, who now propounds social business as an alternative to the crumbling conventional capitalist mode of economy.
He mentioned that the export-oriented apparel sector and remittance would be the prime affected sectors due to this worldwide financial flu.
But, the Grameen Bank managing director also saw an opportunity to restructure the world financial structure and bring the world financial structure in favour of Bangladesh .
For eradicating the most poverty-intensive area of the world, South Asia, Professor Yunus emphasised collaboration of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc) countries and network of highways through its member countries.
He also said that the government should look into the progress in achievement of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as these could be achieved in due time.
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