Muhammad Yunus
Most large organisations now carry a social or environmental mandate alongside a profit one, and the two are managed as separate functions that argue with each other. The result is a stack of pledges, ESG reports, and philanthropy budgets that the operating business does not depend on. The harder question is whether a company can design a real business unit, with its own P and L, whose product is a measurable social outcome.
Muhammad Yunus is the Nobel laureate economist who built Grameen Bank and developed social business as an operating model that corporates, governments, and the Paris 2024 Olympics have used to turn social goals into commercial structures.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Muhammad Yunus
- He has built the model he speaks about. Grameen Bank reached millions of borrowers, 96% of them women, with repayment rates above 95%, and became the template for microfinance in more than a hundred countries.
- His “social business” concept is operational, not aspirational. Danone, Veolia, BASF, Uniqlo, and others have launched joint social business ventures with the Yunus group under defined commercial terms.
- The Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games adopted his framework to open procurement to social and solidarity enterprises, with nearly 500 such companies in the supply chain. Milan-Cortina 2026 has signed a follow-on agreement.
- He sits at the intersection of credibility most speakers cannot reach: Nobel Peace Prize, Presidential Medal of Freedom, Congressional Gold Medal, and recent head of state experience as Chief Adviser of Bangladesh.
- His “three zeros” agenda, zero poverty, zero unemployment, zero net carbon, gives boards a single frame to connect ESG, inclusion, and youth employment work that usually live in separate decks.
Biography highlights
- Founder of Grameen Bank, awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize jointly with the bank.
- Recipient of the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom (2009) and Congressional Gold Medal (2010).
- PhD in Economics, Vanderbilt University; former Professor of Economics, Chittagong University.
- Author of Banker to the Poor, Building Social Business, and A World of Three Zeros.
- Chairman of the Yunus Centre; partner to Danone, Veolia, BASF, Uniqlo, and others on joint social businesses.
- Adviser to Paris 2024 on social business and inclusive procurement; agreement signed for Milan-Cortina 2026.
- Served as Chief Adviser of Bangladesh’s interim government, August 2024 to February 2026.
Biography
Grameen Bank started lending in a Bangladeshi village in the 1970s, before microcredit had a name. The borrowers were women, the loans were tiny, and the orthodoxy at the time said neither group nor product should work. The bank grew to serve millions of clients with repayment rates above 95%, and the model was copied into more than a hundred countries. The economist who built it, Muhammad Yunus, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize jointly with the bank in 2006.
The work since has been about converting that proof point into an operating model that companies can actually run. Yunus calls it social business: a non-loss, non-dividend enterprise designed to solve a specific social problem, governed with the same discipline as a commercial business. Danone, Veolia, BASF, and Uniqlo have set up joint ventures with the Yunus Centre on that basis, on nutrition, clean water, and affordable clothing. His books Banker to the Poor, Building Social Business, and A World of Three Zeros are the reference texts.
The Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games used the framework to open Games procurement to social and solidarity enterprises. Almost 500 such companies were brought into the supply chain. A follow-on agreement has been signed for the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Games. That is unusual reach for an academic concept.
In August 2024, Yunus returned to Dhaka to lead Bangladesh’s interim government as Chief Adviser, following the student-led uprising that ended the Hasina administration. He stepped down in February 2026 after the general election. The detour matters here: he has now run a country as well as built an economic model, and he speaks from both sides of the policy and operating divide.
Key speaking topics
- Social business as an operating model
- Microfinance and financial inclusion
- The “three zeros” agenda: poverty, unemployment, net carbon
- Inclusive procurement and supply chains
- Women’s economic empowerment
- Youth employment and entrepreneurship
- Corporate joint ventures with social outcomes
Ideal for
- Boards and executive committees deciding how to structure ESG, inclusion, and impact work as operating units rather than reporting lines.
- Heads of strategy, sustainability, and procurement at consumer, industrial, and financial companies running joint ventures or supplier programmes with a social component.
- Government and multilateral audiences working on financial inclusion, youth employment, and inclusive growth policy.
- Foundations, family offices, and impact investors choosing between grant-making, ESG investing, and direct social business equity.
Audience outcomes
- A working definition of social business that distinguishes it from CSR, ESG, and traditional philanthropy.
- Concrete examples of corporate joint ventures structured as social businesses, with the commercial terms made explicit.
- The Paris 2024 procurement model as a case study in opening a large supply chain to social and solidarity enterprises.
- A direct view from a Nobel laureate who has also recently led a country on what governments can and cannot do for inclusive growth.
- A frame, the three zeros, that connects climate, poverty, and unemployment work usually managed as separate programmes.