Muhammad Yunus set up the Grameen Bank in his home country of Bangladesh with loan of just [pound]17, to lend tiny amounts of money to the poorest of theoor - those to whom no ordinary bank would lend. Most of his customers - ashey still are - were illiterate women, wanting to set up the smallestmaginable village enterprises. It was his conviction that this new system ofmicro-credit', lending even such small sums, would give such people thepark of initiative needed to pull themselves out of poverty. Today, Yunus'system of micro-credit is practised around the world in some 60 countries,ncluding the US, Canada and France. His Grameen Bank is now a billion-poundusiness. It is acknowledged by world leaders and by the World Bank to be aundamental weapon in the fight against poverty. Banker to the Poor isunus's enthralling story of how he did it: how the terrible famine inangladesh in 1974 focused his ideas on the need to enable its victims torow more food; how he overcame the sceptics in many governments and amongraditional economic thinking; and how he saw his micro-credit extended even