If you recall, Mr. Yunus parlayed his microfinance model into the successful Grameen Bank, with a total loan portfolio of $ billion for 7 million borrowers. In other words, he has proven repeatedly… that the entrepreneurial poor are bankable. He said: “Conventional banks look for the rich; we look for the absolutely poor.
All people are entrepreneurs, but many don't have the opportunity to find that out.” Providing credit access to SMEs is another challenge. According to the UPS survey of SME competitiveness in Asia, Philippine SMEs consider access to funding and working capital as obstacles to their competitiveness. I hope therefore that CMAP will find ways to help address these concerns.