The Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation announced this year’s award winners today. Out of the 8 awards given, the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development Mutually Reinforcing Institutions was the only organizations to receive an award. CARD MRI, a partner organization of the Grameen Foundation, provides more than 10 different products such as microcredit loans, savings, microinsurance, and other financial services.

Some of the other equally as important recipients include:

  • Grace Padaca, from the Philippines, for Government Service. She is being recognized for “empowering voters in the Philippines’ Isabela province to reclaim their democratic right to elect leaders of their own choosing, and to contribute as full partners in their own development.”
  • Therdchai Jivacate, from Thailand, for Public Service. He is being honored for “his dedicated efforts in Thailand to provide inexpensive, practical, and comfortable artificial limbs even to the poorest amputees.”
  • Prakash Amte and Mandakini Amte, from India, for Community Leadership. They are being recognized for “enhancing the capacity of the Madia Gonds to adapt positively in today’s India, through healing and teaching and other compassionate interventions.”
  • Ahmad Syafii Maarif, from Indonesia, for Peace and International Understanding. He is being honored for “guiding Muslims to embrace tolerance and pluralism as the basis for justice and harmony in Indonesia and in the world at large.”
  • Akio Ishii, from Japan, for Journalism, Literature, and Creative Communication Arts. He is being recognized for “his principled career as a publisher, placing discrimination, human rights, and other difficult subjects squarely in Japan’s public discourse.”
  • Ananda Galappatti, from Sri Lanka, for Emergent Leadership. He is being recognized for “his spirited personal commitment to bring appropriate and effective psychosocial services to survivors of war and natural disasters in Sri Lanka.”

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About the Ramon Magsaysay Foundation:
The Asian equivalent of the Nobel Peace Price, the Ramon Magsaysay Foundation’s mission statement “is to honor outstanding individuals and organizations working in Asia who manifest greatness of spirit in service to the peoples of Asia.
The Foundation’s work is supported by stable organizational resources and strong working relationships with with local and international partners. Because of this, the development initiatives of the Magsaysay laureates are better known and more accessible to the public, and are increasingly supported by media and other relevant institutions within and outside Asia.

About Jerry Ostradicky

I work in Advertising Operations at Zillow, but LOVE microfinance. I'm always interested in startups, especially non-profits, reach out to me if you're working on anything cool!