 This is the VOA Special English Economics Report. Modern microfinance started with economist Muhammad Yunus. In the 1970s, he started what became the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. He and the bank shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for the idea of offering small loans to the poor to fight poverty. In 2010, reports of harmful microlending methods and corruption shook the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. Mr. Yunus recently said in the New York Times that things got out of control. He noted that Andhra Pradesh had intensive lending activity at the time. He spoke to Giyaf Naqshabendi about changes in the world of microfinance. He is an expert in international business and teaches microfinance as a business model at the Kogod School of Business at American University. He says the government of India in certain states has started taking steps to guarantee that these institutions are operating under a strict system. Some experts have raised questions about whether microlending lifts women or poor families out of poverty. David Rudman is with the Center for Global Development, a research group in Washington. He says microloans do not do a good job fighting poverty. He says over $3 billion went into microcredit in 2010. But many lenders failed because of bad supervision or failure to repay loans. In one model, governments or non-governmental organizations give money to microcredit operations. Interest income is often used up by costs rather than helping other poor borrowers. But Giyaf Naqshabendi says that model is changing. Mr. Naqshabendi says sustainability is now a main goal. He says there has been a move in the last five or six years to find ways and means by which make these operations sustainable. In his words, sustainable means simply that yes, we are going to rely on donations, but in the meantime, we are going to encourage these borrowers to save some of their money. Money from savings can then be used for new loans. Mr. Naqshabendi says private equity companies are looking closely at microfinance as an investment. New models are being developed to offer more than business loans, for example, educational loans and health insurance loans. For VOA Special English, I'm Alex Villareal. For more business news, for people learning English, go to voaspecialenglish.com.