Grameen Bank a Road Map to Poverty Alleviation from the Poorest Door

Abstract

Bangladesh has been striving since its colonial times to bring about betterment of the rural poor through
different institutional approaches .Most of these institutions failed to approve the clear access of the poor in the state
development resources. The Grameen Bank is an alternative institutional framework for rural development in
Bangladesh, which has achieved considerable success in improving the socio economic conditions of the rural poor. In
its attempt to fight poverty Grameen Bank started out as a money lender for poor people in Bangladesh through its idea
“micro-credit” facility. In addition to developing countries, developed countries such as the USA, the UK and Canada
have also initiated the Grameen Bank model in their country as an outreach for the poorest segment of their population.
The main purpose of this research was to investigate the impact of micro credit on poverty reduction. Since its inception,
the target of the micro-credit movement has consistently been to reduce poverty. Bangladesh is a poor country with a
relatively long history of micro-credit lending. However as this research has demonstrated, there is still considerable
debate in the development economics community concerning the impact of micro-credit on poverty.