This summit will be the largest gathering of top leaders in the field of microfinance in years.

Nilufar will leave Dhaka on November 11 to attend the summit at Halifax in Canada on November 12-15, representing Bangladesh as one of the successful micro-entrepreneurs.

"I am really thrilled," she further told the briefing organised by Citigroup Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Citigroup, which will sponsor Nilufar's trip to Canada.

Earlier on September 19, the Citigroup Foundation awarded Nilufar Yasmin the Best Innovative Micro Business of the Year.

A housewife-turned-entrepreneur, Nilufar, who hails from village Binna at Nesarabad in Pirojpur district, was passing her days with the agony of extreme poverty in 2002 and she was known a little then. At that time, she always thought of how she could earn a minimum living while her husband Abul Kalam used to get only Tk 500 as salary from a sports instrument making shop in Dhaka.

But, after being a 'savings member' of 'Padakhep Manobik Unnayan Kendro' in 2002, she started producing cricket bats with Tk 8,000 loans in assistance of her husband.

Now she owns a two-storied house made of wood and a factory. She has also purchased arable lands measuring an area of 11.25 katha.

Nilufar changed her lot through her innovative initiatives to establish a factory of cricket bats. No one ever thought of making cricket bats from Gewa trees of the Sundarbans as Nilufar did.

Though she is solvent now, her hard work and struggle continue. Her husband, children and eight labourers work along with her day and night.

"Economically, I am not a vulnerable person anymore, but I want to go ahead further," she confidently said.

Electricity is yet to reach her village, but Nilufar dreams of setting up a saw mill there once it reaches. She wants to market the cricket bats with final finishing and stickers.

She also told journalists that with the necessary support, she would be able to export these cricket bats one day.

Nilufar said after learning through work at her factory, nearly 100 people of village Binna have built factories for manufacturing cricket bats, where at least 700 labourers are working.

Former advisers to caretaker government Professor Wahiduddin Mahmud and Rokia A Rahman, Director News of Channel i Shykh Seraj, PKSF Deputy Managing Director Parveen Mahmud and Citigroup Country Officer-Bangladesh Mamun Rashid also spoke at the function.