Email this page to a friend!

Notice (8): Undefined index:  url [APP/views/blogs/index.ctp, line 43]

We Dare Your Office to Live Below the Line
 

We dare your office to Live Below the Line. 

The Live Below the Line: Corporate Challenge Day will be a one-day event where companies across the nation will show support in raising awareness and funding to end extreme poverty. On April 30, 2013 the employees of participating companies will eat and drink on $1.50 a day for one full day, while fundraising and supporting one of our charity partners.

We have 11 different charity partners for whom you can fundraise. By participating in Live Below the Line: Corporate Challenge Day, your company will be featured on various social media platforms. Top fundraising corporate teams will be advertised on GlobalCitizen.org and included on our press-releases. The Live Below the Line campaign team will provide various resources and support for best practice on fundraising and marketing.

Participating in the Live Below the Line challenge provides companies with an excellent opportunity to demonstrate corporate social responsibility and inspire team-building within the office.

How To Sign-Up?

Email gpp_usa@globalpovertyproject.com for  instructions!  
Posted by Judith Rowland in Poverty for column Live Below the Line on Mar 12th, 05:24
Comments: 1 | Post a Comment

Bloomberg Announces $100m for Polio Eradication
 

The end is near. 

Community leaders, politicians and activists around the world have rallied to eradicate polio. Over 40,000 supporters have signed our petition asking world leaders to increase funding for polio eradication. Their voices have been heard.

This morning Mike Bloomberg, Mayor of the City of New York, made a $100 million commitment toward polio eradication. Bloomberg Philanthropies’ commitment will be used to help fund the Global Polio Eradication Initiative’s strategic plan for polio eradication.  

In a statement this morning Mayor Bloomberg explained that, “It’s unthinkable that polio still exists in the world when we have the tools and technology to protect children from this preventable, debilitating disease. Now is the time to invest in making polio history.” 

Mayor Bloomberg said that he was, “thrilled to join the Gates Foundation and other partners in the effort to end this disease once and for all.” The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is a major donor to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. “Mayor Bloomberg’s commitment is a key development in helping to ensure that all children are protected from this and other vaccine-preventable diseases.  I look forward to continuing to work with him on this and other critical global health initiatives,” said Gates.  

Polio has been eradicated by 99.9%. Thanks to global collaboration between public and private organizations, governments and local communities, polio cases have been reduced from more than 350,000 in 1988 to 223 in 2012. There have been only 5 polio cases thus far in 2013. 

The end of polio is in sight. In April world leaders will meet in Abu Dhabi for the Vaccine Summit. The Global Polio Eradication Initiative’s strategic plan established a framework through which polio can be eradicated by 2018. New commitments, such as this morning’s announcement from Mike Bloomberg, will be key to meeting the strategic plan. 

 
Posted by Judith Rowland in Polio for column GPP - United States on Feb 28th, 04:38
Comments: 3 | Post a Comment

Gifts that Give Back
 

It is the most wonderful time of the year.  We are running from event to event, rushing to get packages to the post office, and hoping that we didn’t leave anyone off our lists.  At the very time that we are supposed to be feeling the love of family and friends, we are stomping over each other to get the last flat screen television on Black Friday.  This season should be a time for spreading joy and love. 

The holidays have become an industry valued at over $435 billion each year in the United States.  To put this figure into perspective, Bill Gates recently explained that, since efforts to end polio have thus far reduced cases by 99.9%, only $5.5 billion more would be needed to eradicate polio forever by 2018. It sounds like a lot, but we could wipe polio off the face of the earth for less than 2% of the money we’re spending on the holidays. 

The average household spends around $1,500 on holiday gifts.  As we pass our shopping baskets across the cash register we are voting on the world in which we want to live.  Fair trade or child labor?  Eco-friendly or toxic?  Labor laws or slavery?  The choices that we make at the point of sale shape the way that businesses operate.  For example, the Fair Trade Foundation has grown exponentially since its start in 1992 by providing customers with quality products and making social consciousness a key priority for many shoppers.  Consumers have said that they want the things they purchase to make a huge difference in the lives of others and businesses are responding. 

Many organizations offer products that allow you to give a gift while fighting extreme poverty.  The Somaly Mam Foundation’s Empowerment Store offers jewellery, scarves, and cards that have been made by survivors of sex trafficking.  Each purchase provides increased educational and vocational opportunities for young women.  Made By Survivors sells jewellry and clothing that have been made by landmine victims.  Global Goods Partners sells fair trade products made by artisan groups in 20 different countries.   


This best gift this holiday season is the gift of knowing that, in some small way, you helped bring an end to poverty.  Heifer International allows you to purchase livestock such as goats or chickens for a family in need.  Adopt a Minefield accepts donations to help clear minefields in countries like Cambodia.  The options for socially conscious gifts abound. 

In his story of how the holiday spirit transformed the life of one individual, Dr. Seuss explains, “He puzzled and puzzed till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. Maybe Christmas, he thought... doesn't come from a store. Maybe Christmas, perhaps... means a little bit more!”


 
Posted by Judith Rowland in Fairtrade & Ethical Purchasing for column GPP - United States on Dec 8th 2012, 06:28
Comments: 18 | Post a Comment

Africa: More Than One Story
 

Chimamanda Adichie’s talk “The danger of a single story” tells the riveting tale of Adichie’s experience as a Nigerian interacting with Western cultures for the first time within a university setting. Adichie quickly discovers that the Britain she read about in her storybooks is far removed from the reality of the United Kingdom. Equally, Adichie finds that her Western peers are unable to relate to her and expect her to follow the stereotypes of Africans that they had internalised from films and books. Adichie’s central message is that listening to only a “single story” entrenches stereotypes and prevents us from truly understanding each other.

Here are just a couple of stereotypes I have come across, which were challenged by my experiences living in Ghana.

Africa is poor

We are regularly exposed to media representations of starving Africans surrounded by flies. There is a lot of poverty in Africa but these images tell only a single story. First, Africa is not a country. Africa is made up of 54 sovereign states with distinct cultures, traditions, and languages. Second, not everyone in Africa is poor. The World Bank ranks the GDP of Egypt higher than the GDP of Ireland. Kenya’s GDP was ranked above the GDP of European nations Latvia and Estonia. Kenya also has a range of Commercial and Investment Banks and highly developed infrastructure. There are gourmet French restaurants in Ghana, Rwanda, Togo, and Benin and snappy sushi restaurants dot the continent.

My argument is not that all of Africa has the glamour of Central London but that there are pockets of wealth across the continent. Wealth from natural resources, better governance, African entrepreneurism, investment and aid from developed countries has helped to improve the situation for many and create opportunities for prosperity.

As a result many cities are no longer, or less, reliant on aid. To say that Africa is poor is to ignore the diversity, progress, and opportunities within this continent.

They love it when you take photos of their children!

The media would have you believe that no trip to Africa is complete without a safari, a blog post highlighting your selflessness and some photos with naked African babies. When we get shutter-happy we start to objectify the lives of others. A good friend of mine from Rwanda explains that when Westerners come and take photos of children in her school they feel that the photos will be sold to magazines for money. She wondered out loud to me why so many Westerners want photos of children whose names they do not know?


Africa shouldn’t be treated as a human zoo. Many countries, like the United States, have regulations in place that prohibit photographing children without the consent of their parents. Why is it then that we are so quick to take snaps of kids we find on the streets? Think of how strange it would be if you started taking photos of people coming out of the train station. Why should it be any different in Africa? Get to know the kids, build a relationship, and then consider taking out your camera.

Africa is an incredible continent full of interesting traditions, music, and people. It is critical for everyone to move past the stereotypes ingrained in us by the media and begin to engage with each other on a deeper level. Only when we stop to listen to the voices of Africans themselves will we truly understand Africa and how best to work with Africans to eradicate extreme poverty.

Image one: Building in Sandton, South Africa by Kleinz1
Posted by Judith Rowland in Education for column Issue Analysis on Sep 11th 2012, 12:54
Comments: 7 | Post a Comment

"We have got to get rid of this disease"
 

Janice Nichols and her twin brother, Frankie, were in first grade when polio hit their town.  In a rented cottage far away from others the Nichols family thought that they were safe from the epidemics that had begun downstate in 1916.  As the numbers of polio cases increased families began to relocate but, fearing that New Yorkers could be contaminated, doctors had to inspect each person moving across state lines.  “No one outside of the area wanted the kids,” Janice explains. 

A few days after polio hit their town 8 kids from their class of 24 had been infected and 3, including Frankie, had passed.  On the day that Frankie was buried Janice was admitted to the hospital with temporary paralysis.  Soon after being allowed to go home Janice started an intensive regiment of physical therapy.  At first Janice was unable to walk but physical therapy helped to retrain her muscles and assist her remaining nerve cells to take over for the cells that had been destroyed.  “Most of us have a vivid memory of the first time we take a step,” Janice recalls “because I had private therapy at home I was much luckier than most kids; I didn’t have to go far away, and I didn’t go in just once a week.”  Janice describes that she walked like a “little tin soldier” and that her father was determined that she “wouldn’t walk like a polio survivor”. 

 Janice predicts that she was able to survive polio because it had been detected early and because she received multiple vaccines to protect her the day after her twin brother was diagnosed.  Since 1916 the global community has developed vaccines that are safer and more effective.  In 1954 Dr. Salk produced a vaccine called IPV and Janice was one of the two million children participating in the trials.  “They tried everything but nothing was going to make a dent and nothing remains to make a dent except vaccination,” Janice explains. 

 Polio has been eradicated in the United States since 1979 and cases around the world have been reduced by 99% since 1988.  Polio is currently endemic in only Nigeria, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.  The very things that saved Janice’s life- quick detection, medical equipment, and physical therapy- are frequently unavailable in developing countries.  “A couple of years ago they had an epidemic in the Republic of the Congo.  There was a 40% mortality rate among infected young adults” which was largely because there was “no electricity, few iron lungs, and limited equipment,” Janice explains. 

 In 2003 Janice received an article about polio in the mail with encouragement from Michelle, her graduate school roommate, to share her polio story.  Janice became a life-long advocate for polio eradication and dedicated four years to researching for her book about polio.  Since 2007 she has had regular speaking engagements throughout North America.  “I start my talk by telling about what happened in my suburb.  Then I talk about the disease and the vaccines and what has happened as a result of the vaccine.  Next I talk about what will happen to this world if we don’t get rid of this disease in the next couple years.  When people realize what we’re up against they are more willing to donate,” Janice describes. 

Posted by Judith Rowland in Polio, Global Health for column 1.4 Billion Reasons on Aug 4th 2012, 05:44
Comments: 13 | Post a Comment