Zahirul Alam

Executive Director , IDF
Bangladesh

Mr. Zahirul Alam completed his Master’s with honours in Economics from the University of Chittagong, Bangladesh in 1975. He started his career with Nobel Laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus in 1973 while he was student as the founder member-secretary of the Rural Economics Program (REP) of the Department of Economics from where Grameen Bank Model was developed. He left REP in March 1976 to join Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development (BARD) as Action Research Fellow for a UNPD/FAO action research project on the development of landless poor and the small farmers through microfinance in 1976. He worked in BARD on building a sustainable Microfinance Institution for the poor for about 8 years and then joined ILO in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in March 1984 as a Specialist in Income Distribution and Basic Needs Related Issues and later as Economist in 1989. Now he is working as Executive Director at Integrated Development Foundation (IDF). He is also author of many reports, papers and participated in many national and international seminars and workshops.