To award a Congressional Gold Medal to Dr. Muhammad Yunus, in recognition of his contributions to the fight against global poverty.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of S. 846, a bill that would authorize the award of a Congressional Gold Medal to one of the great humanitarians of our time, Dr. Muhammad Yunus.

Over the last couple of years, we have talked on the floor of this Chamber and in committees about the effects of the recent economic crisis and how it has limited our ability to procure loans in this country. We all know that credit is the lifeblood of both business and daily life and that businesses need capital to invest in tools, labor, and raw materials, and that individuals need credit for both short-term needs and long-term investments such as college educations or to buy a house or a car.

The need to free up credit in the United States is important, but in this great country that offers so much for us to enjoy, it is easy to lose sight of how serious the need for credit is elsewhere. There it's sometimes a matter of surviving or being able to eke out a living. Americans may need a loan to purchase a new car, whereas a person in Bangladesh may need a loan to merely survive.

Madam Speaker, it is a testament to a man we honor today that he both recognized the needs of many for loans of very small amounts of money and devised a system, a system that can be replicated anywhere, to address that need.

Dr. Yunus, born in Bangladesh and the holder of a doctorate from Vanderbilt, made his first step toward solving this problem in 1976 in his native country--and Mr. Carson mentioned this--when he loaned an equivalent of $27 to 42 women and made each a co-guarantor with the responsibility of ensuring that the money was paid back in full. These women then used the money to make bamboo furniture. Previously to buy bamboo, they had been forced to borrow at interest rates that we would consider criminal and certainly usurious. With the loans, they were able to make furniture at a small profit.

Soon, with a small grant from the government of his newly independent country, Dr. Yunus founded what became the Grameen Bank, and lenders, using that model, have made billions of dollars of so-called microloans to millions of people.

I know Chairman Waters has spoken about this and many other Members as to what this has meant to men and women in poor countries around the world. More than 90 percent of the borrowers are said to have been women.

In the year since the founding of the bank, the Grameen model has blossomed, spawning variations that include nonprofits and for-profit investments in projects ranging from information technology and communications to food production with partners ranging from small local companies to giant multinationals. One project has funded the installation of nearly half a million small solar electrical plants producing power for off-the-grid people in Bangladesh.

I remember reading Robert Caro's book about Lyndon Johnson and what electricity meant to the hill country of Texas. The miracle that we saw in America a century ago is being repeated in these countries now--the miracle of electricity.

But this microlending model is not confined to small, poor, developing countries. It's found its way to Canada and even to the United States.

Dr. Yunus holds out the possibility that another offshoot he calls ``social

business'' might be a way to help redevelop Haiti and bring its people out of poverty, as well as in developed countries to provide a path to help the poor become self-supporting without the need for welfare.

Through all of this, Dr. Yunus has been not only a visionary innovator but a tireless advocate for the model that he believes can ease and even end poverty. For this he's been recognized several times and in many ways. He and the Grameen Bank were co-recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. And in 2009, Dr. Yunus received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama.

It is now time that Congress in a bipartisan way honors such a devoted and selfless individual. And that's what we do today with 296 cosponsors.

I commend Senator Durbin for introducing this bill. I commend the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), who introduced the House companion bill, H.R. 2000. With passage today, this bill will go directly to the President's desk.

This is just one of many examples of how a small amount of money changed the lives and the fortunes and the futures of families in countries around this world.

I think of a book I just completed in the last year, Greg Mortenson's ``Three Cups of Tea,'' where a gentleman from California went to really the tribal areas of Pakistan and helped build a school and educate children for just, what we would call an insignificant amount. And it truly is, I think, an inspiring thing to read of people of this character and this commitment.

Madam Speaker, let me close by saying this is an overdue recognition of a vastly important concept and the man who devised it. I urge immediate passage.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I thank my friend from Indiana, and I rise in strong support of this legislation to award Dr. Muhammad Yunus a Congressional Gold Medal for his efforts to fight global poverty.

This bill already has passed by unanimous consent in the other body. I am pleased to have introduced the House version of this bill, which garnered 297 bipartisan cosponsors, an indication of the remarkable impact of Dr. Yunus's work.

Muhammad Yunus is widely known as the banker to the poor, and is one of the world's great humanitarians and an economic genius. In 1974, as Bangladesh was struggling with a terrible famine, this professor of economics led his students out of the classroom and into a village nearby. There they discovered that impoverished people could not get ahead because of the oppressive business practices of money lenders who exploited their poverty and desperation.

With just $27, as we have heard today, of his own money, Professor Yunus liberated 42 victims of these unfair practices from their debt burdens. And from that first experience with the power of a small amount of money, Dr. Yunus developed the concept of microcredit.

With just a few dollars to work with, the poor are able to become entrepreneurs. They sell vegetables or clothing or handmade goods and other products in order to slowly generate and accumulate profits, or they devise clever service industries with a cell phone or a computer that they can buy with their microloan. And it turns out that the poor are wary of debt and are careful stewards of money. Repayment rates for microloans are consistently near 97 percent. And step by step, these borrowers build individual ladders on which they can climb out of poverty and into the mainstream economy.

Within a few years of his first trip to that destitute village, Professor Yunus created the Grameen Bank to act as a bank to the poor in Bangladesh. Today, Grameen Bank has over 2,500 branches. It serves over 8.3 million people in 81,000 villages. It has disbursed nearly $10 billion to the poor, with a recovery rate around 97 percent. Most importantly, it is estimated that nearly 60 percent of Grameen Bank's borrowers have crossed the poverty line. Many of these are women.

Over the last three decades, Dr. Yunus has made the elimination of poverty his life's work. And the concept of microcredit has been widely adopted as an idea. And the idea has evolved from microcredit into the field of microfinance, which now serves the poor with a portfolio of financial services, including savings accounts and insurance and fund transfers, educational loans, and pension plans.

The World Bank estimates that microfinance institutions now serve 160 million people in developing countries. Women, who make up 60 percent of the world's poorest citizens and disproportionately shoulder the burdens of poverty, receive over 95 percent of the microloans. The funds allow them to increase their independence and improve the quality of life for their entire families. Children of borrowers are more likely to attend school and enjoy better nutrition.

Yet even with these accomplishments, there is more to be done. There are 2.6 billion people around the world who live on less than $2 a day. And the poorest 1.4 billion live on less than $1.25 per day. Microfinance still needs to take deeper root in Africa, where 75 percent of the population lives on less than $2 per day. We must commit ourselves to addressing their needs, and microfinance can be a key component of that work. Muhammad Yunus and those who have followed in his footsteps have made it possible for the working poor to transform themselves into an entrepreneurial middle class and for beggars to become business people.

Professor Yunus has been recognized with the Nobel Prize for Peace and the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom. He continues to challenge economic preconceptions and to challenge the acceptance of poverty around the world. We, with this, further honor his achievements and his extraordinary vision of making poverty, as he spoke in Oslo, a concept that future generations may understand only by visiting a museum.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge some of the people who helped bring this bill to the floor. My colleagues Representative Moran of Virginia, Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Representative Carter, Representative McDermott have been instrumental. Grassroots members of the RESULTS advocacy organization from around the country have helped raise awareness about microfinance and the effort to recognize Muhammad Yunus for his efforts. I commend Senators Durbin and Bennett for their leadership in moving this bill through the Senate, and I thank Chairman Frank for his assistance in expediting consideration here in the House.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (S. 846) to award a congressional gold medal to Dr. Muhammad Yunus, in recognition of his contributions to the fight against global poverty.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on this legislation and to insert extraneous material thereon.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of Senate bill 846, a bill to award Dr. Muhammad Yunus with a Congressional Gold Medal in recognition of his contributions to the fight against global poverty.

Credited with developing the concept of microlending--the extension of very small loans to very poor people without requiring collateral-- Dr. Yunus has revolutionized global efforts to eliminate extreme poverty. By making small loans available to entrepreneurs that lack access to the resources of traditional banks, Dr. Yunus has given many people the tools they need to lift themselves out of poverty.

In 1976, Dr. Yunus made his first successful microloan to 42 women from a small village in Bangladesh who made crafts out of bamboo using $27 out of his own pocket. When that first loan was made, it would have been difficult to imagine that it would launch a revolution in the fight against international poverty.

Based on this methodology, Dr. Yunus founded Grameen Bank, which has loaned over $7 billion to over 7.5 million small borrowers. His work has had a particularly profound impact on the lives of women, who have received over 95 percent of these microcredit loans.

This successful model has been implemented in over 100 countries, in both developing nations and prosperous nations like the United States. In the United States, the Small Business Administration is based on the same model and has made over $380 million in microloans to entrepreneurs since 1992. Internationally, it is estimated that over 155 million people have already benefited from these types of loans. And today, the movement has the potential of reaching many of the 2.6 billion men, women, and children that currently live on less than $2 a day.

Dr. Yunus has received a multitude of recognitions for his work, including the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. Currently, the House companion bill offered by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt) has the cosponsorship of over two- thirds of the U.S. House of Representatives.

In light of the strong support we have already shown for this legislation, I urge my colleagues to support Senate bill 846 to award Dr. Yunus the honor of a Congressional Gold Medal.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott).

Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis).

(Mr. DAVIS of Illinois asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman, and I want to acknowledge Congressman Holt. Rush came to me and said, Will you help me gather signatures to get this thing before the House? I've got to have two-thirds of the Members sign this thing. And I said, Sure, I will be glad to help you. He immediately handed me a long list of people. And this is not an easy thing to get done in the House of Representatives, to get 290 Members to sign to bring something forward.

However, the object of this gold medal, Dr. Yunus, is clearly somebody who it's worth working for. He is a marvelous symbol. I got to know him. I have been out to Bangladesh. I have been out in the villages. I have actually sat on the ground when the women were paying their debts and deciding who got how much money in the next week, and watched the whole process go on at the grassroots level. I also had the opportunity to introduce him when he came to Seattle to a RESULTS dinner, where there were about 500 people.

The impact of Dr. Yunus goes far beyond the Grameen Bank. Seattle has, I don't know, probably 40 or 50 microcredit operations working worldwide all through Central America and South America and Africa, where this idea that this man created was taken by other people. And it works everywhere, and anybody can do it.

What's amazing about this is to think about how one man, faced with the poverty in the most densely populated country in the world, Bangladesh,

could say to himself, you know, I think I can change this. And then not only did he think that; he went out and he did it. And I think that's really why a gold medal for Dr. Yunus is such an important part for us to remember in the Congress.

We often think that, you know, we've got to give $100 million or $80 billion or whatever. This man started with $27 and created something that has affected millions and millions of people.

The last thing I want to say is that it's affected the lives of women. Women in the world, their status clearly is below that of men in most countries. But the access to credit for these women of Bangladesh gave them the ability to begin to develop a little business, and accumulate a little capital, and then to buy some school uniforms for their children and pay their school fees. Any country that educates their women, begins to educate the children, begins the development of a country. And Dr. Yunus knew that, that if he could give women a chance to have access to credit--a lot of people laughed at him--but a 97 percent payback rate will match Citibank any day of the week. And this is the work of a man who had an idea and proved that if you have an idea and you are willing to work and believe in people, you can make it work.

So it's a great honor to have a chance to say a few words about Muhammad Yunus. He is a great man, and a gold medal is little enough to give him.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of the Senate bill before us today, which would award Dr. Muhammad Yunus a gold medal for his exceptional work in the field of micro-finance assistance to the most impoverished people around the world.

As this measure notes, Dr. Yunus first tested his belief thirty-four years ago that very small-scale, low-interest loans to the ``poorest of the poor'' could have a major and positive impact on their lives.

He leant $27 of his own money to 42 craftsmen and craftswomen in a small village in Bangladesh.

He went on to establish the Grameen Bank, which created a model for providing on a larger-scale what we now commonly know as micro- enterprise loans.

Today, it is estimated that such assistance--which is low-cost, targeted to those most in need, and expected to be repaid by its recipients so that it can be used again and again to help others--has positively impacted the lives of over 150 million people around the world.

Dr. Yunus has shown us that innovative thinking such as this can result in major beneficial changes for those around the world who survive on less than one or two dollars a day in income.

He has also shown that we don't always need to think in terms of huge amounts of assistance--or expensive agencies and contractors--to carry out such important work.

In many cases, communities assisted by micro-loans are asked to set up groups that help to oversee and manage the loan programs, and they work not only to ensure repayment of the loans but also to give an important sense of community engagement in the effort.

Therefore, micro-loans help provide long-term, sustainable change and are not just a one-time deal with a disappearing impact.

We need more such low-cost innovations, especially now that we all face a global economic crisis and a growing budget crisis here at home.

Madam Speaker, Dr. Yunus was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his efforts to promote micro-finance.

I believe that the Congress as well should award a gold medal to Dr. Yunus.

I am pleased to be the lead co-sponsor, with my colleague, Mr. Holt, of the House version of this bill, which today has the support of 297 cosponsors.

In closing, I want to again express my support for the passage of this bill, which would honor not just Dr. Yunus, but also those who work hard to find new, innovative and low-cost ways to help those most in need.