This study by Md. Mahmudul Alam and Professor Rafiqul Islam Molla on microfinance comes at the right time when the microfinance movement has come under attack from various quarters. There are exaggerated claims and counter-claims about microfinance's impact on poverty alleviation – one side...

To make the book more reader-friendly, we provided a comprehensive summary at the end of each essay. Readers who are time pressed but want to know the basic contents and the key messages of the essays at the shortest time at hand, can do so by reading the summaries of the essays

The microfinance movement that began as a programme of actionresearch in a small village by Professor Muhammad in 1976 has quickly become a global phenomenon, attracting more than 100 million borrowers world-wide. The movement has been hailed as an innovative tool for poverty eradication

Micro-entrepreneurial activities play a pivotal role in rural economic development in the third world countries. As a result, in Bangladesh poverty alleviation through rural centric micro-entrepreneurship development has been focused for more than thirty five years. Over 600 registered and...

Microcredit typically refers to petty collateral-free credits given to groups of poor members in the society for their socioeconomic emancipation. It is claimed to be an effective tool for enhancing income of the poor primarily through creation of self-employment opportunities for them in a...

Calculated under the framework of economic-profit counting, the productivity of microcredit in Bangladesh is found very low. In this survey about 48% of the borrowers had to compromise their normal wages for self-employed labor to be able to pay the high interest for the credit. Similarly its...

The microcredit (MC) program of Bangladesh has been a well-known success story for generation of self-employment, and poverty alleviation. Variants of this MC model are being implemented in more than 60 different countries of the world. It has become almost a universal antidote for poverty...

There is no room for denying the critical importance of microcredit for economic emancipation of rural poor in Bangladesh or any such other country. In analyzing the effectiveness of microcredit program the microcredit providers (NGOs) use accounting profit of the borrowers' enterprises ignoring...

Economic zone or export processing zone in a country is a purpose-built industrial park with infrastructure designed to suit the needs of foreign as well as local investors. In order to tempt foreign investors into the zones the host developing countries offer a variety of incentives. By...