In 1974, Professor Yunus took his Economics students in Bangaladesh to a poor village. They interviewed a woman who made bamboo stools, but who made less than a penny per stool because of all the interest she had to pay to the middlemen. So in 1976, he started the Grameen Bank which gave micro-loans to promote economic growth amongst the world's poorest. Today, they have over 2 million borrowers with more than 1000 branches!