David Bussau, AM
David Bussau is an inspiring social entrepreneur who has been hailed for his innovative approach to solving world poverty. He challenged the conventional wealth redistribution model of development by pioneering a process known as micro enterprise development (MED), addressing the root causes of poverty through responsible wealth creation.
Bussau is the founder of numerous not-for profit organizations including Opportunity International Australia (OIA), a partner organisation in a global network that provides small loans and training to budding entrepreneurs in 28 developing countries, empowering them to start or expand their own small businesses. Bussau is a successful entrepreneur himself who started life in numerous boys’ home and launched his business career at 15 with a rented hotdog stand.
Twenty years later, at the age of 35 and with numerous successful businesses to his credit, he “retired”, having reached what he refers to as the “economics of enough”.
In 1974, Cyclone Tracey hit Darwin and, answering a call for help, Bussau moved his family north and headed up a national movement to assist the victims. Soon after, Bussau began aid work in Indonesia and eventually endowed a private foundation committed to responsible wealth creation and entrepreneurship, believing this was the best way to alleviate poverty. Bussau challenged the conventional thinking that poverty is inevitable and hopeless. Instead he adopted a view that there are many creative and talented people among the poor and they do not have to be perpetual dependents.
“Each of us has the capacity to be incredibly productive and those who realise this are the ones who make the difference in the world,” says Bussau. “For me the challenge is to find ways to release that incredible potential in human beings, to enable that creative force and drive to be expressed.”
Recognising that the key to building any small business is access to credit, OI has distributed millions of loans since it began nearly 30 years ago. In 2006, Opportunity International made more than one million four hundred loans to poor entrepreneurs. More than 87 per cent of the loans were to women, with a repayment rate of 98 per cent.
According to the World Bank, by tackling the causes of poverty at the grass roots, this method has proven to be one of the most effective and sustainable ways to solve poverty. A Manchester University study has shown that for each job created, on average six people are permanently taken out of poverty and 13 people in the community benefit, so over thirteen million people were potentially helped by OI in 2006 alone.
After being awarded 2003 Ernst & Young Australian Entrepreneur of the Year, David Bussau made history as the first ever social entrepreneur to be inducted into the World Entrepreneur of the Year Academy in Monte Carlo. In 2001, he was featured on the ABC television series “Australian Story”. In 2000, he was chosen by The Bulletin magazine “as one of Australia's 10 most creative minds” because of his innate capacity to respond to poverty in a new and creative way.
David continues his work in enterprise development by building relationships and providing consultancy services to governments, multinationals and other organizations.
Note: Other awards bestowed on David were the Order of Australia in 2001, the Conrad Hilton Award for Entrepreneurship in 2005, The ACFID Human Rights Award in 2006 and the Beta Gamma Sigma Award for Entrepreneurship in 2007. |
