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CARING
The crushing burden of microcredit
Friday 04 April 2008
In Bangladesh, FRANCE 24 reporters find that far from alleviating poverty, microcredit has been plunging people deeper into debt.
Special Report CaringFriday 04 April 2008
By FRANCE 24
Microcredit changed Shobi Rani’s life. An impoverished yoghurt seller, Rani travels across her region in northern
Three months ago, Rani received a loan for 500 euros from the Grameen Bank to start her little dairy enterprise. Every week, a bank official carefully checks how her business is going.
The brainchild of Rani’s fellow countryman Mohammed Yunus, who won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, the Grameen Bank has been hailed for executing the microcredit mantra: giving the poor a helping hand, not a handout.
Called “the banker of the poor,” Grameen has been attracting big businesses such as Danone, the French food giant, who supplies the yoghurt to Rani and thousands of other women in the area involved in similar projects.
But the situation is far from rosy in Kalihati, one of the first Bangladeshi villages to benefit from Grameen’s low interest credit scheme. The villagers here who have taken a loan are unable to reimburse their credit, and claim to be harassed by Grameen Bank representatives. Korshed Alom, a former debt collector, was put into early retirement for having questioned the Grameen Bank’s methods: “Their technique is to scare borrowers and insult them. We tell them to sell their clothes, that they have no other choice. I’m not proud of myself, but several times, I had even been obliged to say ‘sell your children.’”
The Bank’s representatives choose not to respond to these accusations. It is impossible to obtain an interview with Mohammed Yunus, and the Grameen Bank headquarters are off-limits for journalists who are too curious.
The Grameen Bank counts more than 100 million clients in the world’s poorest countries. It targets 500 million clients in 2020.
25/04/2008
Grameen bank likes to talk to the media... not!
Par Cassandra
How eloquent to see the Grameen bank staff calling security guards! Obvioulsy, Grameen bank likes to be transparent about its activities and microcredit schemes
10/04/2008
Grameen Bank : shame on you!
Par Patrick Teetaert
First of all, sorry for my poor written English.
I became interested in the way Grameen Bank works by seeing a video, distributed in Flanders, Belgium.
It is titled 'Bangladesh na de zondvloed', and is part of a collection made for pupils and students ('Biblio-video' by 'couleur locale', Algemeen Bestuur Ontwikkelingssamenwerking - BRTN - 1994).
In this video Grameen Bank is focused as a blessing for poor people in developping country's. Against very low intrest they provide lowns for 'getting out of the mud'. They especcially help women, because women think about how to use the money for the benefit of the family (and men think about themselves and friends...).
Although the video is 14 years old, it interessed me, because I've had the privilege of seeing how the poor people of Bangadesh struggle, with an astonishing everlasting smile, against a situation they will never be able to change by themselves : the power of nature, en the corruption of their leaders.
If Grameen Bank had done what they claim to do, indeed they schould be honoured.
But reading what I'm reading now, the only conclusion is that Grameen Bank is, once again, a maffia.
A maffia who's intentions are really, to suck out any power and energy that is left in those people, who can only survive by their human energy. Making profits out of the desperation of the poorest of the poorest, their is no excuse, none at all!
Very disappointed,
Patrick Teetaert