Live Below the Line is an awareness and fundraising campaign that challenges people in developed countries to feed themselves with the equivalent of the extreme poverty line, to raise awareness of the challenges faced by those trapped in the cycle of extreme poverty.
In 2011 the campaign is being run in Australia, America and the United Kingdom, where people are invited to help raise awareness of the issue of extreme poverty, and raise funds for anti-poverty projects.
The campaign was born in Melbourne, Australia in 2010, and challenged Australians to feed themselves with $2 a day for five days, to raise funds for crucial anti-poverty projects. In just its first year the campaign involved over 2,000 Australians and raised over half a million dollars. In 2011 the campaign has grown internationally, with the challenge taking place in Australia, the United Kingdom and United States in 2011.
The campaign is now one of the fastest growing anti-poverty campaigns in the world, and is expected to raise over a million dollars for anti-poverty initiatives in 2011.
In the United Kingdom, the 2012 Live Below the Line campaign is running from the 7th to the 11th of May. Information on registering can be found at http://www.livebelowtheline.org.uk/
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In 2005 the World Bank defined the Extreme Poverty Line as $1.25 US a day - that is, someone would be considered to live in extreme poverty if they lived on an amount equivalent to somebody living in the United States, buying United States goods with US$1.25 a day. In 2011 (taking into account inflation and purchasing power), the equivalent amounts for the United States, Australia and United Kingdom are US$1.50, AUD$2 and £1 respectively.
The figure is determined by translating the 2005 figure into a local currency figure (using purchasing power parity) and then accounting for inflation since the 2005 date. A more detailed explanation of how the Australian figure was arrived at is available on the Global Poverty Project's site here.
The concept of Live Below the Line was born in the back yard of a Melbourne share house by two friends - Rich Fleming and Nick Allardice - over a few drinks one evening in late 2009. Both were passionate about fighting poverty, and had already been doing so for a number of years - but together they were worried at our ability to really understand at an emotional level the realities of extreme poverty.
One was from the Global Poverty Project, one from the Oaktree Foundation - and together they plotted the creation of a campaign that could simultaneously help tens of thousands of Australians begin to understand and connect with the issue of extreme poverty whilst also providing a platform for creating incredible change for the worlds' poor.
Seeing an incredible opportunity to engage huge numbers of people with the realities of extreme poverty whilst also achieving really substantial and significant outcomes in anti-poverty initiatives, they came together to create Live Below the Line.
Live Below the Line was officially born in June 2010, with the first campaign running from August 2 - 6. In its first year alone all expectations were exceeded, with over 2000 people participating, raising over $520,000.[1]
Global Poverty Project
The Global Poverty Project is an international education and advocacy organization working to catalyse the movement to end extreme poverty. We exist to increase the number and effectiveness of people taking action to end extreme poverty, to ensure that the world eliminates extreme poverty within a generation.
Using the world-class multimedia presentation 1.4 Billion Reasons we're raising awareness of our ability to end extreme poverty and demonstrate how every person can contribute to the end of extreme poverty.
We're inspiring and empowering everyday people in workplaces, schools, universities, churches and communities around the country to become leaders in the global movement to end extreme poverty.[2]
Oaktree Foundation
The Oaktree Foundation is one of Australia’s fastest growing and most dynamic international aid and development organisations. Entirely run by young volunteers under the age of 26, Oaktree has 61,000 members around Australia and has lead some of Australia’s biggest poverty campaigns – including the 2006 MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Concert in Melbourne, and the MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY Roadtrip campaigns in 2007 and 2010 which succeeded in securing a bipartisan commitment to increasing foreign aid by $4.3 billion.
Oaktree sees education as the key to enabling the worlds’ poorest individuals and communities to lift themselves out of poverty. As a result Oaktree works across the Asia Pacific region – in places like East Timor, Cambodia and Papua New Guinea – to build schools, train teachers, provide scholarships so impoverished children can attend school and much more.[3]
Funds raised in the first Live Below the Line campaign are being used to fight poverty through education initiatives in the developing world and education and advocacy projects in Australia.[4]
The Oaktree Foundation is investing over $400,000 into its international development work in Papua New Guinea and Cambodia. In particular this means:
This means that thousands of young people are getting access to an education for the first time - providing them with a means to lift themselves out of poverty.
The Global Poverty Project are using funds raised to empower a new generation of anti-poverty advocates within Australia:
The Global Poverty Project's education work will empower tens of thousands of Australian students, building the social movement required to see an end to extreme poverty within a generation, and supporting the change required to alter the systems that perpetuate extreme poverty.