BENGALURU: Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus will play a big role in how the Paris Olympics in 2024 will be conducted. The Professor from Bangladesh, known for founding the Grameen Bank and furthering the cause of social business, on Wednesday said that the Olympics and the Paralympics in 2024 will focus on social business and circular economy and that his team was working to design the games around these themes.
Yunus is in the city for the first edition of the Social Business Day to be conducted outside of Bangladesh. The event will be held over two days at Infosys campus in Electronics City. Making a case for the expansion of the social business model, Yunus said possibilities for social businesses existed in every sphere. Social business is defined by Yunus as a non-loss, non-dividend company designed to tackle a social problem. Profits are re-invested into the business itself.
“Somehow the sports world showed interest in what we are doing. The opportunity of the Olympics is a great one to use emotions to change perceptions,” Yunus said. He said it was his wish to see every company create a small subsidiary that engages in social business on the side. “When you do it as charity, you get tired. Here, the business generates funds for re-investment,” he said. The push for social business through the Olympics will be through IMPACT 2024, a platform designed to leverage the strengths of the global event to further Yunus'cause of three zeros: poverty, unemployment and zero net carbon emissions. An agreement between Yunus Centre and the Olympics organisers was signed last month.
At the Social Business Day, Professor Yunus is also likely to sign an agreement with the NITI Aayog to promote social business in India. He also expressed a desire to see the younger generation looking more towards entrepreneurship.