2008 Senior Australian of the Year
Micro-finance pioneer, David Bussau AM, who, after his ‘retirement’, helped create more than two million jobs for poor families in developing countries through the company Opportunity International, was named 2008 Senior Australian of the Year at an Australia Day eve ceremony in Canberra hosted by the Prime Minister.
The Minister for Ageing, Justine Elliot, said: “Mr Bussau should be congratulated for helping lift thousands of families out of a cycle of poverty. Since Mr Bussau co-founded Opportunity International, it has grown to provide micro-finance and enterprise development services in more than 20 developing countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe.
“Its trust-banks lend money – often to groups of women – to start businesses and it helps with their planning and marketing. The loans are later paid back and the money re-invested the same way – creating jobs for more than two million Third World women.
“Without trust-banks, people have to resort to borrowing from loan sharks and landowners, often leaving debts to future generations.”
In 1974, following Cyclone Tracy, Mr Bussau took a volunteer construction team to Darwin to help rebuild the city. Then, in 1976, he was called on again to help a small rural village in Indonesia devastated by an earthquake.
“He took his family to live with the villagers and helped rebuild their lives. This experience convinced him that poverty wasn’t a hopeless problem and it led him to develop his ideas on micro-finance.”
Mr Bussau was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2001 and Ernst and Young made Mr Bussau the 2003 Australian Entrepreneur of the Year – the first social entrepreneur to be given the award.
Today, Mr Bussau continues his work in micro-enterprise development by building relationships and providing consultancy services to governments, multi-national companies, and other organisations that have caught his vision and joined the fight against poverty.
“He is an outstanding role model and demonstrates the invaluable contribution being made here and internationally by older Australians,” Mrs Elliot said.
