The Fortune Global Forum Visionaries

Victor and William Fung

Industry: Consumer Goods
Title: Chairman and CEO, respectively
Organization: Li & Fung Group

    Dubbed the last "Great Chinese Dynasty" by some, brothers Victor and William Fung have helmed their Hong Kong-based sourcing company, Li & Fung Group, since 1973. Over time, it has transformed from a traditional family company into a vast enterprise of 80 offices in 44 countries around the world, giving job opportunities to hundreds of thousands of workers in over 30,000 factories in Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Africa.

    And the results of the company's expansion and acquisitions are plain to see. As one of the world's largest producers of consumer goods, they're responsible for making everything from L'Oreal cosmetics to hardware bathroom faucets.

    "What my brother and I did was take a Hong Kong-only base to Taiwan, Korea, and then Southeast Asia," William Fung told Fortune. "We followed the globalization of manufacturing of consumer goods, which was all part of our plan to professionalize the family company."

    Despite what Fung describes as the "global economic tsunami," the company still reported a net profit rise of more than 30% for 2009 thanks to smart cost cutting and it aims for $20 billion in sales for 2010.

Seth Berkley

Industry: Science
Title: Epidemiologist
Organization: International Aids Vaccine Initiative

    While working for the Centers for Disease Control in Uganda during the mid-1990s, Seth Berkley experienced the ravaging effects of HIV/AIDS on Kampala, the Capital City, where 18.6% of residents were infected.

    "Living there, I began to see colleagues and friends die," he recalls. "I thought to myself: my god, this is our black plague." So in 1996, he shifted gears and established the International AIDS Initiative (IAVI) with the purpose of funding and sponsoring HIV vaccine efforts.

    Fifteen years later, IAVI has made significant headway, even if the end goal remains somewhat elusive. IAVI has raised more than $850 million, and last fall, the organization, in conjunction with Scripps Institute, announced that researchers had found two new antibodies that could lead to a vaccine. IAVI is also currently sponsoring four clinical trials of HIV vaccine candidates in humans, as well as 8 preparatory studies for HIV vaccines in the U.S., Europe, India and Africa.

    Says Berkley: "What we're offering ultimately is a vision of a world without AIDS, of creating the tools necessary to get there, of using science and technology to save hundreds of millions of lives."

Muhammad Yunus

Industry: Economics
Title: Founder
Organization: Grameen Bank

    Credit this Bangladeshi financier for essentially revolutionizing the banking systems in many third-world countries with the concept of microfinance. The financing mechanism enables low-income individuals with little-to-no financial resources to start up businesses and other ventures by lending them small amounts of money.

    Yunus founded the Bangladesh-based microfinance organization, Grameen Bank, in 1976, and since then, the bank's 2,564 branches have lent over $9 billion to 8.1 million borrowers in over 10,000 villages, 97% of whom are women. In fact, approximately 97% of Bangladeshi villages receive aid through Dr.Yunus' revolutionary brainchild.

    In 2006, the Norwegian Nobel Committee selected Yunus to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work, and more recently in 2009, President Barack Obama honored Yunus with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Rikin Gandhi

Industry: Agriculture
Title: CEO
Organization: Digital Green

    The M.I.T. grad turned aeronautical-astronautical engineer now helms the New Delhi-based Digital Green, an NGO funded in part by the Gates Foundation that teaches farmers in small rural villages the latest agricultural techniques via multimedia presentations and personal demonstrations. Currently active in four states in India, the plan is to expand to 1,200 villages total throughout South Asia and Africa within the next three years.

    At least once a week, farmers gather in a small group of 15 or 20 in a common area of their village, where they view a six to eight minute instructional video, varying according to region and state, that is projected onto the side of a building. The lessons are also supplemented with more in-person group demonstrations.

    Gandhi says his new media take is 10 times more effective per dollar spent in converting farmers to better farming practices than more traditional approaches. It also transforms farming into a communal activity.

    "Normally, these practices happen in isolation," Gandhi explains. "A farmer adopts this practice here or this practice there. But it's really seeing these farmers integrate many of these practices together and really seeing a change brought about in their lives and the lives of their whole family that makes this first-hand experience an experience to have."