France
ONE members rally to protect life-saving EU aid!
Tomorrow, EU leaders will meet in Brussels to decide the EU budget for 2014-2020, including the proposed €51 billion of lifesaving EU aid to the world’s poorest.
EU aid works. Between 2004 and 2009, it helped enrol more than 9 million children in primary education, vaccinate 5.5 million children against measles, and connect more than 31 million people to clean water. If the proposed €51 billion EU aid budget is adopted, in the next 7 years 15 million more children could be enrolled in school, 9 million more could be vaccinated and 51 million more people could be connected to clean water.
But proposals for smart European aid are under serious threat. At the last summit in November, proposed development assistance to the world’s poorest was slashed by €6.1bn. And some leaders want to make even deeper cuts that could take funds below current spending levels: this would have a devastating impact.
Ahead of this week’s critical talks, ONE members from all over Europe have been rallying to ask European leaders to protect lifesaving EU aid at the proposed levels.
In the next step of our Lifesaver campaign, ONE estimated that it would cost just 3 euro cents (or 2 pence) per week, per EU citizen to reverse proposed cuts to aid for the poorest. ONE members have therefore decided to make their small change count! In the UK, over 2000 ONE members have asked for postcards to send their 2 pence to Prime Minister David Cameron urging him to protect proposals for lifesaving EU aid in the budget negotiations. In Germany, ONE members have sent postcards to Chancellor Angela Merkel, adding their 3 cents. In Brussels, the team collected by hand over 230 postcards for President of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy including around 60 Brussels-based interns and young professionals who came to our meet-up last week. ONE Brussels hand delivered postcards to Van Rompuy’s staff and passed on the message that Europeans are counting on him to ensure their voices are heard. ONE has also started handing in postcards to the other European governments at their embassies in Brussels.
In France, as part of the French version of ONE’s Lifesaver campaign, “sauveteur du siècle”, ONE members have mailed more than 500 postcards to President François Hollande, urging him to make sure that, in Winter sales season, EU leaders don’t try to make savings on the back of the world’s poorest.
In parallel, ONE also estimated how much it would cost each government per year to reverse the cuts to the proposed €51 billion for EU aid. For Germany that’s €174mn, for the UK €113mn and for France €154mn – peanuts compared to overall annual government spending.
Beside the “Make Your Change Count” action, ONE has also launched a tumblr blog (in French, German and English), a hilarious take on the serious day-to-day work of Lifesaver campaigners fighting to protect aid in the EU budget.
Finally, in order to help people get their heads around the confusing EU budget figures, we have produced an infographic on what current cuts on the table to the proposal for EU development aid could actually mean on the ground. The figures are stark: if the proposed cuts are agreed on, 1.9 million less pupils could be enrolled in primary school. If deeper cuts are decided, the impacts would be even worse. The infographic is also available in French and in German.
Why not help spread the word? You can start by signing ONE’s petition to protect European aid.
And to learn more about the impact of EU aid on the ground read these 5 stories about successful EU-funded projects in Africa.
This week really matters – we’ll keep you updated and hope to see EU leaders doing the right thing tomorrow and protecting lifesaving EU aid for the world’s poorest.
Are you the #lifesaver of the century?
Between 2004 and 2009, aid from the European Union helped enrol more than 9 million children in primary education, vaccinate 5.5 million children against measles, and connect more than 31 million people to clean water. All this was achieved with a tiny part of the EU budget.
Yet right now, EU aid is under threat. Europe’s leaders are in the midst of crucial budget negotiations over EU development assistance. Cuts proposed by some leaders to these life-saving programs—which only cost citizens €15 per year—would have a devastating impact on the world’s poorest people.
We need your help to defend aid and help millions of people around the world. Today ONE is calling on everyone to tell EU leaders that they want to continue being a #lifesaver.
This week across some of Europe’s busiest places we’re launching a series of events that will beam the pictures of lifesavers like you onto gigantic jumbotron displays for the world to see!
You can see it for yourself at Victoria station in London, Parvis de l’Hôtel de Ville in Paris and Whashingtonplatz in Berlin.
If you can’t make it in person you can take part online and join our lifesaver campaign, by telling EU leaders you want to continue being a #lifesaver.
You can follow the events online on twitter or on our facebook page.
70 women. 1100 miles. 4 cities. 4 days. 1 goal – fight AIDS
Tomorrow a group of 70 inspiring women will begin a four day trip across Europe with one goal in mind – to help ensure no child is born with HIV by 2015.
The Cash & Rocket (RED) Tour is part of ONE’s sister organization (RED)’s campaign (RED)RUSH TO ZERO. It aims to raise awareness and funds for the Global Fund’s fight against AIDS with a focus on reaching the goal of an AIDS-Free Generation by 2015.
The women including organizer, Julie Brangstrup founder and CEO of Cash & Rocket, (RED) CEO Deborah Dugan, Dr. Patricia Nkansah Asamoah from the (RED)-funded Tema clinic in Ghana, LOVE editor Katie Grand, fashion stylist Charlotte Stockdale, model Lily Becker, sisters Jemma and Jodie Kidd, and entrepreneur Umberta Beretta will start their trip in London’s Berkeley Square.
They will stop in Paris, where (RED) partner Bugaboo will unveil its latest design collaboration and then continue their journey with stops in Geneva, Milan and culminating in the final destination, Monte Carlo, on June 10th.
(RED)RUSH TO ZERO is a series of in-person and digital events and experiences involving brands, celebrities, gamers, music fans and consumers around the world. Since launching in 2006, (RED) has raised more than $190 million to fight AIDS. The recipient of these funds is the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. (RED) helps finance Global Fund HIV/AIDS grants that have impacted the lives of more than 14 million people affected by AIDS in Africa.
“While the Cash & Rocket (RED) Tour will undoubtedly form new friendships and long lasting memories, we must not forget the clear aim is to raise funds for (RED)RUSH TO ZERO, (RED)’s campaign to help deliver an AIDS Free Generation by 2015 by virtually eliminating mother to child transmission of HIV,” said Julie Brangstrup,. “As a mother of five I feel deeply moved by the ‘double jeopardy’ of suffering faced by millions of mothers and their babies each year. The Cash & Rocket (RED) Tour is more than just a tour; it’s a chance for a group of powerful and influential women to come together and take part in an event that can really make a difference in raising money and global awareness for this important cause.”
(RED) CEO Deborah Dugan said “The world is at a historic moment in the fight against HIV/AIDS, with the opportunity to end mother-to-child transmission of HIV by 2015 and take a critical step toward defeating this global pandemic. We will only get over the finish line if we create new funding opportunities and new ways to keep people engaged and energised. What a great way to raise money and awareness across Europe about the goal and who better to do that than 70 amazing women!”
Find out more about the tour and how you can get involved at http://www.redrush.com/road-tour/
ONE VOTE France is over : the real battle begins
On March 12th, ONE France launched one of its most ambitious campaigns yet: ONE VOTE 2012. The idea was to take advantage of the presidential election to call to the candidates to revise the current relationship between France and Africa. The campaign covered everything from aid and its efficiency to the duty of transparency of French companies working in Africa.
During almost two months, ONE members quizzed the candidates using twitter on the following areas:
- France has to keep its promises, especially the 0.7 % aid commitment by 2015, in order to be a credible actor and a real leader of a just and shared globalization.
- France’s aid must be accountable.
- France has to make sure that its companies contribute to the development of the African continent and has to ensure that they are more transparent.
ONE France launched a ONE Vote 2012 website featuring a video that starred former presidents of the Republic. When candidates responded to the questions, ONE members could vote on whether they liked or disliked their answers.
The campaign was a great success. All the candidates answered our questions, with the exception of extreme right leader Marine le Pen. We even received an answer in video to our questions (see the answer of Kader Arif, from elect President François Hollande’s team).
Last Sunday, the presidential election ended, and François Hollande was elected President of French Republic. It is thus to him that goes the heavy but necessary duty to revise the link uniting France and the African continent for the coming five years.
Within the framework of the ONE VOTE campaign, François Hollande made a commitment towards making the 0.7 % Aid promise. He also declared support for more transparency in the extractive industries in their operations abroad.
We hope that the new president will keep to his commitments: he can be inspired by a recent poll that demonstrates that an ambitious development policy is supported by the French people: only 19 % of our fellow countrymen want the French aid for development to be decreased. According to another survey published last month, 74 % of the French people are in favour of a financial transaction tax, which would raise money for development.
François Hollande has in his hands the power to raise the French international politics as high as France’s ambitions. And the countries of Africa should be his first strategic allies in this adventure. The new president has the chance to make make the relationship between France and Africa a powerful remedy for the challenges ahead and to open the way to a better future for all. A first opportunity will appear to the new president on May 18th, during the G8 summit. The summit will discuss an initiative to reduce global poverty and hunger.
ONE will keep up the fight for a new relation between France and Africa. Thank you all, our members, our Facebook fans and Twitter followers, who signed and shared the petition, who mobilized and made these commitments possible.
And please, keep mobilized: let us not give up and let us call on the leaders of the G8, of whom François Hollande is henceforth a member, to break the vicious circle of hunger and poverty by signing the petition!
Let’s celebrate immunization week without easing up the effort
By Awa Marie Coll-Seck, minister of Health and Social Action of Senegal, and Guillaume Grosso, director of ONE France.
For World Immunization Week, all global health and development actors decided to take part in the mobilization initiated by the World Health Organization to give a boost to vaccines coverage through the world.
Celebrated across five continents, this year’s mobilization, with the slogan “Protect the world — get vaccinated,” is an opportunity to remind us that vaccination can prevent each year between 2 and 3 million deaths.
If it is a question of looking at the glass at half full, we can only be delighted by the progresses recently registered worldwide. The report is simple: the rate of vaccine coverage is increasing and touching more and more children every year. In just 2010, an estimated 109 million children less than 1 year old have been administered three doses of the diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis vaccine.
New vaccines are available in developing countries, which were — until now — non-existent or under-used, allowing to fight the first two causes of infant mortality in the world: pneumococcus and rotavirus, which are the origin of the main causes of pneumonia and acute diarrhea.
This success would not have been possible without GAVI, the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, which mobilized the necessary funds to accelerate the access to new and under-used vaccines in developing countries. For example, Senegal was recently approved for the introduction of the vaccine against the pneumococcus, joining the 46 countries supported by GAVI that were approved for the same vaccine since 2010. The impact of the international community¹s effort towards immunization is henceforth tangible.
The pessimists, and maybe the realists, will also see the glass half empty. We still estimate today at 1.7 million the number of children who died from a disease that should be avoidable through vaccination, before having reached their fifth birthday — a daily scandal that takes place in the biggest silence.
Finally, and this is a paradox, looking at all the successes registered, some parents and health care professionals think that vaccination is not necessary anymore, and is no longer a sanitary urgency. Thus some countries see their vaccinal cover decrease and the resurgence of diseases such as diphtheria, measles and poliomyelitis.
This dynamic has quite an echo in France where the rates for vaccine coverage for vaccines such as measles remain insufficient. This lack of vaccination should be addressed shortly.
This is the direction that we, NGOs, governments and actors in health and development wish to look for this immunization week: celebrating the successes without easing up the effort.
This piece was originally published on the Huffington Post France.
“And you, how do you see the world today?”
On September 6th 2000, under the aegis of the United Nations, 189 state leaders signed the Millennium Declaration and made a commitment for 8 ambitious objectives: drastically reducing extreme poverty, hunger, HIV and malaria, illiteracy, the degradation of the environment, discrimination toward women, child mortality but also improving maternal health and developing solidarity between Northern and Southern countries.
To increase awareness on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), 8 famous movie directors (Jane Campion, Mira Nair, Wim Wenders, Gus Van Sant, Gaspard Noé, Jan Kounen, Abderhamane Sissako and Gael Garcia Bernal) were given carte blanche to realize a short film and offer their vision of the world of today which were united in a movie entitled “8″.
This movie is at the origin of the “NO TIME LEFT” adventure, a festival of short and free format movies where those 8 movie directors handed over the reins to new talents for them to transmit their own vision of the world of today. In 2011, the festival gathered more than 300 movies, among which 20 were selected and 6 were prize-winners. “Useful” prizes were created (professional cameras, order of reports) to continue the mission to develop a socially-committed cinema.
And you, how do you see the world today? Young directors are invited to participate to a socially-committed cinema for this second edition of Ni Time Left festival.
You have until May 4th to submit your short-films of fiction or animation (from 3 to 12 minutes) on one of the following themes: Poverty, Education, Gender equality, Child Mortality, Maternal Health, HIV or Malaria, Environment and Northern/Southern solidarity. All fictions made between January 2000 and today are accepted.
Six prizes will be awarded by prestigious juries in the following categories: Le Temps Presse, Cinema, Public, Environment, Children and Woman.
The festival’s final award-ceremony will take place in Paris City hall on June 7th, 2012. Professional cameras are among the prizes (Canon 5D/7D), orders of reports (or corporate videos), as well as a guarantee of distribution on the award-winning films partners’ networks.
In order to participate to the 2012 edition, visit www.notimeleft.org and post your “and you, how do you see the world today?” movie on the website.
Support the festival and participate to the development of a socially-committed cinema. Thank You!
Listen to the directors of the ‘8’ movie:
See the story of one of the ‘NO TIME LEFT 2011 award-winners, Fatou Diarra:
Find out more on the website: www.notimeleft.org
ONE Vote 2012 urges strong relationship between France and Africa
As France goes to the polls today for the Presidential election, ONE intern Mohammed Diabate reports on ONE France’s ONE Vote 2012 campaign.
A month ago, ONE France launched its first presidential campaign, ONE Vote 2012. Disappointed by the lack of debate on development issues in France we asked our members to call on the presidential candidates to reconsider the France-Africa relationship in order to open the way for a better future for all.
France and Africa’s agendas have never been so intertwined. AIDS cannot be fought in France alone, climate change does not stop at France’s borders, and the instability of a country like Somalia undermines France’s own trade and security. Meanwhile, as Europe is facing one of the worst crises in decades, Africa’s exciting new business opportunities could just be what it takes to boost France and Europe’s own economic recovery.
Thanks to the great mobilization of ONE members across the country, nine candidates out of ten responded and believe it is important to detail the development issues in their programs, except for the extreme right wing candidate Marine Le Pen.
Transparency in the extractives industries, the increase of development aid, but also aid effectiveness and transparency were the important issues raised by the candidates. Even if some answers left us unsatisfied, we are very pleased that the candidates have responded to ONE Vote.
The responses have all been assembled on the ONE Vote website for ONE members and others to judge for themselves.
And if you live in France whatever your favourite response is, rendez-vous on Sunday, April 22, in the voting booth to decide our common future. For the France that we want. And the role that we want our country to play vis-à-vis the rest of the world and especially the most in need. Stay tuned !
50,000 voices heard by Europe’s leaders
When European leaders met yesterday to discuss a new anti-corruption law they had nearly 50,000 voices urging them to stand up to corporate lobbyists – thanks to you.
Our petition calling for them to ignore the attempts by oil, gas and mining companies to water down proposed EU laws ensured at helping African citizens spot corruption got an amazing response with 46,500 ONE member signing it after just one week!
Your voices echoed around London, Paris, Berlin and Copenhagen as committed ONE members delivered your petition to key European leaders ahead of the crucial meeting for national business ministers in Brussels on Monday, 20th February.
Tania, a ONE member in Copenhagen (pictured below), was greeted with enthusiastic support by the Danish government – as holders of the EU Presidency their leadership is crucial to ensure we get the strong laws we need.
In France the names of the 46,500 supporters collected in just one week were sent to the Elysée while a group of ONE activists met outside to demonstrate their support (picture below).
In the UK our members used Valentine’s Day to deliver the petition to the UK Business Minister along with a giant love heart as a Valentine’s gift!
While in Germany Bob Geldof, in Berlin for the “Cinema for Peace” gala, met with the German Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger and an advisor to the Chancellor Mr. Heusgen to tell them about our petition and ask them to support the new EU law.
This all helped send a clear message to European leaders that we expect them to stand up to corporate lobbyists on behalf of the world’s poor. The initial feedback is encouraging – Ministers were generally in support of the transparency law, although some countries are yet to commit to specific details that need to be included. Responding to the meeting yesterday our European Director Adrian Lovett said:
“Ministers have taken an important step towards ending the secret payments oil, gas and mining companies make to governments around the world. But getting the detail right is critical. Without this an incredible opportunity to help lift millions out of poverty will be missed.”
And we’re now in a battle to get that detail right.
With some companies lobbying hard to keep their payments secret we will need to ask for your support again. The meeting this week was the first stage of the discussions that will continue for several months. To get the law passed EU Members States must reach an agreement with the European Parliament, which is currently drawing up its own position.
ONE will continue to join brave African citizens fighting corruption to ensure the profits from the trillions of dollars paid to governments for natural resources isn’t misused by corrupt officials, but spent wisely on vital services like health clinics, roads and schools
Please ask your friends to join and help us stand up to corporate lobbying by signing our petition to European leaders:
http://act.one.org/sign/trillion_dollar_scandal/
Thanks to you we’ve made a fantastic start to the campaign to end the trillion dollar scandal.
60,000 and counting: ONE members call on Germany and France to keep their promise to the world’s poor
Many thanks to the more than 60,000 ONE members that have signed our petition calling on the German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the French President Nicolas Sarkozy to keep their promise to the world’s poor.
Earlier this month ONE members – and current interns – Anne and Katrin handed the long list of signatures (burnt on a CD) over to the Federal Chancellery and the FDP headquarters in Berlin.
You can see more photos on facebook.
Even though our petition continues we wanted to hand the signatures over before an important EU summit– in case the financial transactions tax (or FTT for short) was discussed.
It’s been a busy few weeks for the campaign. Prior to the summit President Sarkozy announced that France will charge a tax of 0.1% on financial transactions. German opposition leader Sigmar Gabriel demanded: “We need to see deeds.” According to a spokesperson of finance minister Schäuble, however, the government does not want to follow Sarkozy’s approach, at least not for now. Instead the existing proposal by the European Commission, which is more extensive, will be further examined. In fact, the President Sarkozy’s FTT allows certain exceptions, which is why some French NGOs consider the tax to be inadequate.
That means our French colleagues and the team here in Germany have to keep pushing for a FTT against poverty! The campaign continues – we’ll keep you up to date.
ONE final push
As leaders gathered in France today for the G20 Summit of wealthy nations, they brought with them the voice of hundreds of thousands of ONE members.
We’ve been campaigning hard this month to highlight the food crisis in the Horn of Africa and call on world leaders to ensure they break the cycle of famine. Our petition has had a phenomenal response now totalling over 400,000 signatures. So we wanted to make sure our members’ voices were heard loud and clear in the corridors of power.
On Monday as President Sarkozy prepared to leave Paris to host the G20 Summit in the south of France, we broadcast a huge video projection on the side of the city’s iconic Hotel De Ville. The film loop included the powerful celebrity F-word video “famine is the real obscenity”, the message that by then, over 360,000 ONE members had called on leaders to take action, and a scrolling list of members who had signed the petition. Strong media coverage of the event ensured the message was seen far and wide across France.
On Tuesday a group of ONE members joined our European Director delivering the campaign to the UK Government. With the G20 looming and a surge in the number of people signing up, the petition total had jumped to a staggering 400,000 by that afternoon – requiring a large trolley to deliver it!
On Wednesday ONE’s team in Berlin, pictured here in their “Nicht Mehr Hungrig” (“Hungry No More”) t-shirts outside the Chancellery Building, handed in the petition to the German Government. Along with pressure from our staff and members across the United States, this ensured the leading G20 powers have felt the pressure to act going in to today’s Summit.
We’ll be updating here about the Summit’s progresses, and stay tuned for a post early next week giving an overall assessment.
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About the Blog
The International ONE Blog is a daily log of the anti-poverty movement. The site is operated by ONE staff, with guest contributions from ONE volunteers, members and allies.
The content of each post and each comment represents the views of that author and does not necessarily reflect the views of ONE. ONE does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office, and any post expressing support or opposition for a candidate is not endorsed by ONE.
TAGS: Aid, Brussels, EU budget, European Union, France, Germany, ONE, UK