Make Poverty History
by Renee Blodgett on July 27, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Intel’s Tristan Wilkinson introduced me to Chris Ward from Comic Relief while I was in the UK.
He’s working on a campaign called 1GOAL that goes live on August 20th. 1GOAL’s mission is essentially to make poverty history.
As an official partner of the FIFA 2010 World Cup in South Africa, 1GOAL is an initiative from the Global Campaign for Education based out of Johannesburg.
Their aim is to secure 30 million people to engage in this campaign globally (by signing a digital petition) so that by the end of the World Cup, the noise around the issue of getting every child into education by 2015 (as Governments promised in 2000) is so loud that countries who have to act now to keep their promise feel compelled to do so.
The campaign is being backed by many Governments, faith groups, the private sector, celebrities and footballers and it is very much felt from within the sector that this is the one MDG that could be really achieved.
They have already received support from major names such as Gordon Brown, Nelson Mandela, Bono, Richard Curtis, and Kevin Rudd (Australia PM).
Over 200 countries will be involved in this initiative; Africa is obviously a key target for generating interest and signatures for the campaign – along with USA, Brazil, Japan, Australia and countless others.
Keep your eyes open for more information as the campaign goes live in August and if you have an opportunity to support them, please do. Doesn’t every child deserve an education?
