Pakistani microfinance organization Owner wins Asia’s Nobel

Muhammad Amjad Saqib won the ‘Ramon Magsaysay’ award on Tuesday for his efforts in the Pakistan microfinance Industry. Saqib’s organization named ‘Akhuwat’ is the biggest microfinance in the world.

LAHORE, PAKISTAN – On Tuesday 31st August, Muhammad Amjad Saqib, the owner of Akhuwat Foundation, won the ‘Ramon Magsaysay’ award. The Ramon Magsaysay award is the Asian Equivalent of the Nobel Prize and is often termed as ‘Asian Nobel’.

Amjad Saqib received the award for developing and carrying Akhuwat to become the nation’s largest microfinance organization. Akhuwat is interest and collateral free thus being the first of its kind, it has helped a lot of the Pakistani lower class.

Muhammad Saqib launched Akhuwat about 20 years ago with the aim to provide micro loans with zero interest and easy repayments, so that the lower class can benefit from it. The organization up until now has given away around 900 Million US dollars in interest free loans. The interesting factor however is the organization’s 100% loan repayment rate.

Saqib started Akhuwat with a mission to make a poverty free society that largely focuses on compassion and equity. Akhuwat from a microfinance based organization has now turned it into a large scale NGO that works towards the betterment of humanity. The organization in the past few years have done significant work such as building schools, libraries, clothing drives and health services. Akhuwat has also brought up programs that focus on helping oppressed communities such as the ‘Khwajasira Program’.

After winning the Asian Nobel Prize for Pakistan, Muhammad Saqib received congratulations from a lot of people. It surely was a great achievement for both Pakistan and Akhuwat Foundation. Saqib also received a congratulations Tweet from PM Imran Khan, the PM in the tweet congratulated him and said that his contributions are an addition to the Riyasat-e-Medina goal.

Other people to win the Ramon Magsaysay Award

The Ramon Magsaysay award gets its name from a Filipino President who died in a plane crash. The award is one of Asia’s highest honors, previously people and organizations such as Abdul Sattar Edhi and The Citizen Foundation have also won this award.

This year alongside Dr. Amjad Saqib, two other people have also won the award. The first winner is Firdausi Qadri who won the award because of his untiring contribution to the vaccine development. Another winner is Filipino fisherman ‘Roberto Ballon’ who won the award for successfully reviving a dying fish industry.

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