Paris, 7 January 2009

René Carron has been elected Chairman of the new Grameen Crédit Agricole Microfinance Foundation by its Board of Directors at a meeting in Luxembourg at end 2008.
René Carron, 66, a farmer by profession, has been Chairman of the Board of Directors of Crédit Agricole S.A. since December 2002 and a member of the Board since 1999. He is Chairman of the Crédit Agricole des Savoie Regional Bank, which resulted from the 1994 merger between the Haute Savoie Regional Bank and the Savoie Regional Bank, of which he had been Chairman since 1992. He is Vice-Chairman of the Fédération Nationale du Crédit Agricole, of which he was Chairman from July 2000 to April 2003. He sits on the Board of Directors of GDF Suez and Fiat SpA and the Supervisory Board of Lagardère SCA. René Carron is President of FARM, the Foundation for World Agriculture and Rural Life. He is also President of CICA (Confédération Internationale du Crédit Agricole).
Former Mayor of Yenne (Savoy), René Carron has been President of the Savoy Chamber of Agriculture (1983-1992), Savoy District Councillor (1992-1998) and Vice-President of the Savoy District Council (1995-1998). He was also President of the “Savoie 92” Association in charge of promoting the Savoy area during the lead-up to the Winter Olympics in Albertville.
René Carron is a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur, Officier de l'ordre national du Mérite, Commandeur du Mérite Agricole and Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres.

The Board of Directors of the Grameen Crédit Agricole Microfinance Foundation also appointed Jean-Luc Perron as the Foundation's Managing Director.
Jean-Luc Perron, 56, is a philosophy and law graduate and a graduate of the Ecole Nationale d'Administration (Voltaire promotion). Before joining Caisse Nationale de Crédit Agricole, now Crédit Agricole S.A., in 1985, he was head of the Budget Office at the Ministry of Agriculture, then Financial Adviser to the Minister of Agriculture and lastly Finance Director of the National Forestry Office. At Crédit Agricole S.A., he was successively head of agricultural, housing and rural financing, head of the tourism and leisure division and then chief executive officer of Crédit Agricole Consultants. In 1997, he was promoted to head of international investments and sat on the Board of Directors of Banca Intesa (Italy), Banco Espirito Santo (Portugal), Emporiki Bank (Greece) and various other banks in the emerging countries.
Since 2002, Jean-Luc Perron has been European Affairs advisor to Crédit Agricole S.A.'s executive management.

Grameen Crédit Agricole Microfinance Foundation
Grameen Crédit Agricole Microfinance Foundation is a Luxembourg foundation created jointly in 2008 by Crédit Agricole S.A. and Professor Muhammad Yunus, 2006 Nobel Peace Price winner and founder of Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. Its mission is to help eradicate poverty through microfinance by providing financial and technical support to microfinance institutions in developing or emerging countries, with a particular focus on institutions that provide support to the agricultural and rural sector.