We have often referred to Hans Rosling’s work and his ability to make statistics easily accessible to mainstream audiences. This evening will see him presenting an hour long documentary on UK TV entitled The Joy of Stats.
In this programme he will navigate through years worth of public data bringing order and clarity to the vast sea of figures and demonstrating the true power of statistics.
If his past work and the trailer below are anything to go by this promises to be an enjoyable and informative programme. We thoroughly recommend watching it.
The Joy of Stats will be shown tonight at 9pm on BBC Four.
GPP Intern Uschi Klein reviews the book ‘Warrior Princess’.
Warrior Princess… a story of hope, courage and determination
A complete page-turner from beginning to end, I was deeply moved reading Warrior Princess by Princess Kasune Zulu and co-authored by Belinda Collins. It’s a highly inspirational and compelling book that puts you, the reader, in a position of asking yourself what you can do to end extreme poverty.
Princess Kasune Zulu tells her powerful and moving story by starting with the devastating news that she is HIV-positive, which is critical in a country where every six seconds a child dies of hunger. Every 14 seconds another child loses a parent to AIDS, and every 30 seconds another child dies from malaria.
Princess is only 21-years old and a mother of two at the time she learns of the tragic news, but she demonstrates throughout the book that succumbing to self-pity and dissolution is not an option. Instead, she takes us on her extraordinary journey of helping those at-risk and affected by the virus for years to come.
Written in chronological order highlighting her personal landmarks, this journey takes Princess from the dusty villages of Zambia that she calls home, to the global corridors of power, meeting world leaders from the White House to the United Nations.
It’s absolutely inspiring to see how a young, compelling woman with a strong faith turns the odds of a personal tragedy into positive living filled with hope and resilience, determined to follow her calling of fighting extreme poverty, HIV and AIDS in Africa.
She depicts the current crucial issues we face in the Global South - what it’s like to live on less than US$1.25 a day, and the impact of HIV/ AIDS on one’s life, the family, the extended family and the whole community. But more than that, she shares her vision of Africa becoming a prosperous continent, free from international debt and no longer requiring international aid.
Princess speaks of a place that if we all work together and influence others to do the same, will become a place where we see children growing up safe, healthy and educated and where homes are safe and secure with clean running water and abundant crops.
It’s a vision that Princess asks us to make reality.
British Prime Minister David Cameron has just minutes ago finished a major foreign policy speech in London, in which for the first time he publicly outlines the government's reasons for upholding the promise to reach aid levels of 0.7% by 2013.
You can read the full speech here, and see the bits about aid below:
Britain’s moral authority in the world depends on showing that we uphold our values.
And there’s one more area where, despite the economic pressures we face, this new Government has been determined to hold firm: our commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of our GDP on aid by 2013. We will meet that target and we will do so for good reasons.
Our aid programme, like the activities of the myriad of charitable aid organisations, literally saves lives. It helps prevent conflict, which is why we have doubled the amount of our aid budget that is spent on security programmes in countries like Pakistan and Somalia.
And for millions of people our aid programme is the most visible example of Britain’s global reach. It is a powerful instrument of our foreign policy and profoundly in our national interest.
That theme – pursuit of our national interest – has been at the heart of everything I have said this evening.
Our foreign policy is one of hard-headed internationalism. More commercial in enabling Britain to earn its way in the world, more strategic in its focus on meeting the new and emerging threats to our national security, and firmly committed to upholding our values and defending Britain’s moral authority even in the most difficult of circumstances.
And, in tones reminiscent of some of our comments in 1.4 Billion Reasons, at the start of the speech he said:
I’ve just come back from visiting two of the fastest growing economies in the world. China, with average growth of nearly 10 per cent a year for the last three decades and set to return as the biggest economy in the world later this century.
And Korea, which in 1960 had a GDP only twice that of Zambia but which today has a GDP forty times higher.
In Seoul I was at the G20, forged at the height of the financial crisis, it’s now the main forum for global economic decision-making, bringing together not only the United States and China, but also Brazil, South Africa, India, Russia.
Beijing and Seoul provide good vantage points to reflect on the huge changes sweeping our world: the rise of new great powers, the shifting balance of economic power and the tensions of globalisation.
This interconnected world, the world of restless markets so well represented in this room here tonight, is creating huge new opportunities for the countries that are able to seize them.
We applaud the government - and all the major parties - for their commitment to ring-fencing aid. But, alongside this rhetoric, we will be keeping you informed of how the Government are spending your money, ensuring that aid goes to fighting poverty, and is focused on making the biggest possible difference.
The Coalition’s pledge to ring-fence the aid budget is about to come under attack. After the dust settles from George Osborne’s swingeing cuts, attention will turn to what’s been protected and why.
Towards the top of that list will be the decision to ring-fence the aid budget, growing it to 0.7% of Gross National Income by 2013. In an environment of cuts, it won’t look good to be opening schools in Lagos and closing them in Leeds, as a range of pundits are sure to remind us.
But, it would be wrong to confuse this populist anger with public support. As I travel the country speaking to thousands of people with the Global Poverty Project – in universities, churches and businesses – there’s clear support for the government’s decision. These aren’t aid experts that I’m talking to, they’re everyday people. They’re people who don’t know much about development, who make the occasional donation, but above all, who want to know what actually happens when they or their government give.
People are telling me it’s a matter of justice. We’ve made promises to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable, people who had nothing to do with the cause of the crisis. It’s a mark of our integrity as a country that we haven’t run from our commitments just because it’s hard. We should be proud that all three major parties have committed to ring fence aid and pass the 0.7% aid target into law during this parliament.
I’m hearing that we live on a connected planet, and that more than ever we are no island unto ourselves. Our economic recovery depends in large part on the emergence of new markets like India – a country that is phasing out aid in favour of stronger trade ties. Swine flu showed last year that our health is connected to the health of people all over the world. As the tragic death of aid worker Linda Norgrove showed just last week, aid is a part of our fight against extremism in Afghanistan. And, the emergent consequences of climate change are hitting the worlds’ poorest right now, and we need to scale up our efforts to ensure that they’re equipped to prevent more damage.
Finally, I’m hearing that it’s right to ring-fence aid because done right, it works. Up and down the country, people tell me about wanting to give aid in a way that enables people to stand on their own two feet, so they don’t need aid in the future. They’ve heard about the success of things like the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and they want the government to scale up their investment on issues like these that have a tangible impact.
We have developed a tool that allows you to send an email to you local or national paper at the click of a button, so that you can join those already supporting the ring-fencing of the aid budget and make sure that the negative views of the press are not the only voices heard.
However, with this support comes a demand that our aid money isn’t wasted on things that don’t work, or that aren’t about reducing poverty.
Here, there are concerns. The Financial Times report that the increase in aid could be back-loaded to the last year are a recipe for poor result. It’s simply not possible for DFID to scale its budget by upwards of 30% in a year and provide maximum value for money.
Likewise, the focus on working in conflict states is welcome, but it’s risky. So is the focus on business development, as any entrepreneur can tell you. Some of these projects will inevitably fail, and the Government needs to be clear about how they’re going to explain this to the public.
Good intentions with aid are no longer good enough. The Government needs to be pragmatic about what it can achieve, and ensure that they’re not setting themselves up for failure. The public’s ongoing support is conditional on clear evidence that the aid we’re giving is making a difference. We don’t just need to have value for money, we need to see it.
This requires a conversation with the British public, beyond DfID promoting itself and its projects. It requires going back to them to say what’s working and what’s not, and how aid is only part of the answer to fighting poverty. On Wednesday night, just a few hours after the Spending Review, 500 people will gather in London to join this conversation. The Global Poverty Project are premiering 1.4 Billion Reasons on DVD, bringing the live presentation that has led us to conversations with 20,000 people in the UK, to new audiences.
Because without conversations like these, we’ll soon have an aid budget without a constituency, and soon after, no aid budget.
I hope that you are all well and that your 2010 has gotten off to a great start. It certainly has for GPP. After months of planning the Project has finally launched in the UK with a series of incredible presentations!
The first event of the UK’s 1.4 Billion Reasons presentation to the UK public was at the One Young World Summit in London at the beginning of February. It was an incredible honour to present alongside Bishop Desmond Tutu, an absolute hero of those working to end poverty. It was my first time meeting Bishop Tutu and it was lovely to speak in Zulu with him. One of the most profound things he said to me was when he told be about his involvement in the apartheid movement. In his words, he didn’t mind when he was attacked because he had signed up for the struggle, but it was very difficult when they hurt his family, his son in particular. I was moved by the lengths that he went to and sacrifices he and his family had to make along the way.
The presentation at One Young World went so well and received the only full standing ovation of the day from a packed audience of 1000 young representatives. We also received great feedback through all of our digital channels like twitter and facebook. It was a wonderfully affirming way to kick-start operations as we geared up for larger launch events and awesome to meet people from all around the world who want to bring GPP to their respective communities.
The second big event was the launch of our Church presentation at St Pauls’ Cathedral in London to an audience of 1000 people including Mr Douglas Alexander MP and the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu. Once again thanks and congratulations must go to Elisha London for setting up such an amazing opportunity for GPP. Having the opportunity to present in such a stunning venue has been unparalleled. The highlight was definitely when Arshbishop Sentamu broke bread emulating an act of Mother Teresa’s to symbolise the responsibility we all have to our brother and sister.
The final launch event was our presentation at the Corn Exchange in Cambridge. Cambridge is really where it all began in the UK and is the town I’ve called home for the past year and a half. It really was the best example of what GPP is all about because a group of volunteers worked tirelessly to pull together an audience of 1000 people demonstrating what grassroots movements can do to mobilise and engage an audience (it should be noted the population of Cambridge is just over 100,000). The highlight of the night for me was when the Master of St John’s brought along the candlesticks that William Wilberforce donated to the College when he was an undergraduate. The Master lit the candles in ceremony and they remained lit for the duration of the presentation. As you will know if you’ve seen 1.4 Billion Reasons, Wilberforce is a man who features prominently and is a personal hero of mine. It was a deeply touching symbol and was capped off with an amazing rendition of Amazing Grace by ‘The Gents” who created an arrangement specifically for the event.
It really was one of our best presentation to date. I’d like to make special mention of Laura O’Reilly who led the Cambridge team and was responsible for organising a remarkable evening. Thanks so much Laura!
We also took some time last month to meet with some of GPP’s Global advisors at St John’s College Cambridge for a strategic planning review of GPP operations for 2010-2011. It was an awesome few days with a group of very dedicated individuals and I look forward to operationalising the work we laid out over those few days. Thanks to Clive Burcham, Michael Smellie, Lisa Fox, Laurie Lee, Wei Soo, Simon Moss and Elisha London who travelled long distances to meet with us.
Some points in summary that I would like to share with you are:
The plans to roll-out in the USA from mid-2010 are taking shape!
Financial sustainability for Australian and International teams is a key priority.
The GPP Film – Clive and the team at TCO have been working hard. Watch this space!
Communications strategy for Australia, UK and USA – we are moving to centralise all communications and accelerate our digital strategy.
2010 Global Strategy – we are bringing together a plan to support our country teams in a unified way
We’ve got a lot of exciting campaigns and projects coming up this year and we can’t wait to share them with you. Make sure you keep tuning into the website and blogs for updates.
The final launch event was our presentation at the Corn Exchange in Cambridge. Cambridge is really where it all began in the UK and is the town I’ve called home for the past year and a half. It really was the best example of what GPP is all about because a group of volunteers worked tirelessly to pull together an audience of 1000 people demonstrating what grassroots movements can do to mobilise and engage an audience (it should be noted the population of Cambridge is just over 100,000). The highlight of the night for me was when the Master of St John’s brought along the candlesticks that William Wilberforce donated to the College when he was an undergraduate. The Master lit the candles in ceremony and they remained lit for the duration of the presentation. As you will know if you’ve seen 1.4 Billion Reasons, Wilberforce is a man who features prominently and is a personal hero of mine. It was a deeply touching symbol and was capped off with an amazing rendition of Amazing Grace by ‘The Gents” who created an arrangement specifically for the event. 
