A few months ago, Bono made a really huge statement during his TED Talk: Extreme poverty can be virtually eliminated by 2030. If it sounds too good to be true, consider this: it’s going to take an extraordinary amount of support from both activists and world leaders alike to make this statement a reality.

First, I want to talk to you about momentum. Extreme poverty has been halved in 20 years, and if we keep going at this current rate, we can and will achieve our ultimate goal. But ONE members, we need to make sure that the velocity – the speed – is there. If citizens don’t care, neither will world leaders. So we need to keep putting pressure on them to continue moving on extreme poverty – diligently and urgently!

Here’s a video to show you what I mean. You are the push the G8 needs to help reach our goal.

OK, so now that you understand that part, let’s talk about what you can do right now. 

The G8 is coming up on June 17, and our super smart policy team has done the research (read our report, Summit in Sight: The G8 and Africa from Gleaneagles to Lough Erne) to identify what issues need to be tackled right now.

The verdict? Food and transparency.

Why food? Because Africa needs to grow and thrive –  feeding itself, lifting millions from poverty and preventing chronic malnutrition.

Why transparency? So Africans can have the information they need to call governments out on corruption.

Here’s another thing our team discovered: If we don’t tackle those two issues now, the task to end extreme poverty by 2030 will be doubly difficult. 

Remember what we said about velocity?

We need YOU, from now until the G8, to raise your voice and tell G8 and other leaders that transparency and accountability aren’t just concepts – they’re concrete issues that must be tracked, measured and improved upon.

Our petition for the G8 reads:

Dear World Leaders,

This year, commit to fight chronic malnutrition and unleash a transparency revolution. By acting now, you can help transform millions of lives, put power into people’s hands and set a course to end extreme poverty by 2030.

The petition may sound broad, but when we deliver your signatures, it will include all the fine print, which is outlined right here in our report. For transparency, we need governments to make solid commitments on extractives transparency, tax transparency and open data. For food, we need world leaders to fund Africa-led agriculture, strengthen and expand the New Alliance, and back credible plans to tackle chronic malnutrition.

Well, what are you waiting for? Click here to sign the petition now!

Remember, if there’s no velocity, there’s no momentum. So sign this petition now and let’s get these G8 leaders MOVING on bringing extreme poverty down to zero!

Our ONE members know that Bono is just as much an activist as he is a rock star – you see it in the work he does with ONE during every campaign. But for those of you who know him mostly as the front man of U2, you may be wondering: What drives him to care about poverty so much?  

Acclaimed interviewer and broadcast journalist Charlie Rose set out to find the answer to this question and more during his nearly hour-long interview with Bono on his activism, rock music, business and more.

One of the first things he does is clarify his thoughts on poverty. Like Nelson Mandela, he believes “poverty is not a natural condition,” and that it is “manmade.” To him, activism is about fighting injustice. “I’ve always been on a justice tip,” he said, “rather than a charity one.”

Bono discusses the impact of US foreign assistance. “The United States — it’s a heroic story. You are way out in front in the fight against AIDS. Of the 8 million people that are on anti-retroviral drugs, most of them are alive because of America — Do Americans know that?” he says. “Do people know that they’re part of this incredible story? To me, this is as heroic as your intervention in the second World War. And no lives down, just lives saved.”

The discussion also reveals some illuminating things about Bono, like his thoughts on religion and his relationship with Bill Gates. He even talks about his songwriting process and the work on U2′s next album.

The interview was aired last night on PBS’s The Charlie Rose show, which is now available to watch in the player below. This video a great way for ONE members to learn more about our cofounder and his mission to fight poverty, and for those who just know Bono for his music – see a different side of the rock star.

Here are more of our favorite quotes from the interview: 

- “I am a salesman … I think I’m a good salesman of ideas, songs, melodies, if I believe in them. People getting out on the streets, getting organized and fighting to eliminate extreme poverty is working, and that’s the mission, because I believe if people understand it and see the successes of it, then they’ll do more of it.

- Talking about John Lennon and the song Imagine: “I loved so many things about John Lennon. He wrote the blueprint. But imagining wasn’t one of them. I’m more of a doing, more of an actions, more of a building, following my nose, following my curiosity to understand people better, understand the world better, understand myself better.

- “People say songs are like your children, no they are like your parents. They they tell you what to do, they tell you how to behave, they tell you how to misbehave, how to dress. Everything you do is directed by the songs.”

What was the most surprising thing you learned about Bono in the interview? Tell us in a comment below.

Kudos to Roger for not only being brave enough to ask this question, but for doing all the research to be able to answer it, too. I’ve worked with Roger for over a year now at ONE (and read both his books, too) – and this TEDx Talk from him brought tears to my eyes. I have never seen such die-hard passion and sincerity in an activist until now, and I am proud to say I work with him. Please find 20 minutes today to watch this video – then let him know what you think in a comment below.

Did Roger’s TEDx Talk inspire you? Leave Roger a comment below. Then take action for chronic child malnutrition and sign our petition here.

Well! Now, we’d love for you to bring the issue of good nutrition home to your community by joining chef, ONE supporter and food activist Jamie Oliver for Food Revolution Day on May 17, a global day of action for people to make a stand for good food and essential cooking skills. Whether you are fighting poverty and hunger, or obesity and diet-related disease, we need to change the way we think about food.

Hosted by the Better Food Foundation, the GOOD Foundation and the Jamie Oliver Food Foundation, this event encourages participants to cook and eat fresh local produce; to share cooking skills and food knowledge; to join forces within communities and get as many people involved as possible. 

So, how do you get involved?

1. Check to see if there’s an event already happening in your community. This will be a great way to meet like-minded nutrition activists. Reach out to your local Food Revolution Day volunteer and see what’s going on. See, you’re already making connections!

2. If there’s no event, consider starting your own. The Food Revolution Day website has a lot of great resources, including this toolkit, to help you create an awesome event in your home town. Your event can be hosted anywhere – a favorite restaurant, your child’s school, even your own kitchen. The toolkit includes some great ideas, like hosting a whole wheat sandwich-making potluck at the office or inviting friends over to make pizza at home using fresh toppings. Make sure you add it to the Food Revolution Day map so people are aware of your event.

3. If you can’t do either, share it with your friends. Perhaps they’d be interested. You can tweet or post a Facebook message about the event right from the Food Revolution Day website.

We hope you can join our friend Jamie Oliver in lighting a fire in your community by hosting a Food Revolution Day event. We’re thinking about doing one at the ONE office – so stay tuned for photos and stories from our experience!

Are you thinking of doing a Food Revolution Day event? Tell us in a comment below – and let’s get a conversation started on good nutrition!  

At this critical juncture, the world wants to know: How much aid does China give Africa? Does it help or hurt aid from the United States and other Western donors? It’s been hard to tell, since China releases little information, outside estimates vary widely, and their aid doesn’t come in the form of traditional OECD-type assistance. Plus, there aren’t any mechanisms to accurately measure aid from non-DAC countries. Perhaps until now.

To help answer these questions, an organization called AidData compiled a database of thousands of media reports on Chinese-backed projects in Africa from 2000 to 2011. The database includes information on 1,673 projects in 51 African countries and on $75 billion in commitments of official finance.

Here’s what they discovered: official development finance to Africa seems to be roughly similar in size to the finance provided by the US. And that – a pretty significant amount – is just from the official numbers. According to Brad Parks, the co-executive director of AidData, it’s kind of impossible to give an exact number, since so much aid comes in the form of labor, expertise and other kinds of non-official aid like in-kind donations, making it really hard to measure.

But before you make your assumptions about Chinese aid, here’s some surprising facts on Chinese aid from the Center for Global Development’s new report on the findings from AidData, “China’s Development Finance to Africa: A Media-Based Approach to Data Collection,” which you can access here.

1. Chinese aid to Africa is not new 
Although this may be the first time you are hearing about Chinese aid to Africa, it’s not new. China has been giving aid to Africa since 1956.

2. The majority of Chinese aid from the past decade, among other things, go toward transport and storage, energy generation and supply and communications.
Some Africans say that the Chinese, unlike donors in the West, have a knack for knowing what Africans really need – including vital infrastructure projects like these. According to economist Yan Wang from Peking University, China accounts for more than 30 percent of total value of infrastructure projects in Africa, higher than other donors. And African governments, businesses, and citizens are all clamoring for infrastructure investment.

3. Women, food aid and education rank as some of the lowest priorities for Chinese donors
No explanation needed here, but experts at AidData suggest that it may be due to the fact that these are major focus areas for Western donors.

4. Ghana, Nigeria and Sudan are the biggest recipients of Chinese aid
Those countries received about a quarter of a trillion dollars in the past 10 years. Most of the projects are going toward – surprise, surprise – infrastructure, like oil pipelines.

 5. Chinese aid takes a very different “form” than traditional Western aid 
Not necessarily a bad thing, just different. These forms (or “unofficial finance”, as the report calls it) include foreign direct investment without state involvement and NGO aid. This makes it hard for experts, both in the West and in China, to track.

6. There’s a lot of assumptions about Chinese aid – it’s hard to say whether they’re true.
Many people are saying that China is giving to Africa just because they want access to their natural resources, don’t care about environmental or labor standards, and funding projects that have a weak link to growth. But the Center for Global Development encourages people to do their research when making these claims. Why? Because there’s no robust evidence to prove these points. Read up on it in Section 3 in the report.

AidData’s database is the first step in increasing transparency on Chinese aid to Africa – but it is by no means a completed project. Hopefully, thanks to the help of crowdsourcing, it will help measure aid from other emerging G20 countries like India, South Korea and South Africa, which like China, do not give aid through traditional DAC standards.

Kudos to AidData for creating this database, and we’re excited to learn more insights on aid from new donors. And don’t forget to read CGD’s report here.

Did any of these facts surprise you? Tell us in a comment below. 

“You can’t build a country without concrete.”

The statement has particular relevance in Haiti, where, more than three years since a 7.0 magnitude earthquake resulted in extensive death and destruction, the country is still working to repair and rebuild and assume a path of sustained economic vitality.

Luis Garcia (pictured), spoke about the importance of basic building materials like concrete when he described his work in Haiti to an OPIC delegation in February. As Vice President for Planning at Haiti 360, Garcia oversees  projects that not only produce badly-needed concrete, but also highlight the critical role of the private sector in addressing urgent developing world needs such as modern infrastructure.

Haiti 360 – one of multiple OPIC-supported projects that were initiated after the 2010 earthquake – has used a $6 million OPIC loan to support startup costs of two plants producing high-quality concrete used to rebuild homes, roads and even an airport runway. In 2012, more than 500 homes were built with concrete from the new plants. Some of the homes, like those pictured below at the Cabaret housing settlement, were built to tap into the country’s sunny climate. They have solar panels on the windows and come with ATM-like machines, where residents can swipe cards to keep track of the power they use. Haiti 360 is now one of Haiti’s largest concrete producers, and is establishing a series of micro-mixing sites around the country so it can better meet the demands of local builders in different regions. The company is also planning to donate a percentage of its profits to local charities.

My work in international development has led me to Haiti several times but when I visited the country in February with an OPIC delegation led by OPIC President and CEO Elizabeth Littlefield, it was my first visit since the earthquake three years earlier. Today there are about 300,000 Haitians living in tents, down from almost three million who were left homeless after the earthquake. Long a poor country facing multiple development challenges, Haiti today faces the immediate challenge of housing and feeding a large displaced population, and is hoping to do so in a sustainable manner.  Construction underway throughout the country is aimed not just at repairing damage, but extending roads, bolstering infrastructure and fostering new industrial development beyond the capital city of Port au Prince, which is overcrowded with displaced people and job seekers.

The work I witnessed during my visit in February also underscored how governments, private businesses and NGOs all have an important role in this country, which U.S. Ambassador Pamela White has described as “too rich to be poor.” Indeed, Haiti is rich in talent, youth, innovative spirit and land. All of these resources were on display when our delegation visited the Cabaret Housing Settlement, where about 156 houses will be built with the support of Development Innovation Group (DIG). A Maryland finance and development firm, DIG is using a $17 million OPIC loan, together with grants from USAID and the Clinton-Bush Haiti Fund, to support lending in amounts as small as $1,000 for mortgages and home repairs for low-income borrowers. Builders at the Cabaret site are sensitive to the urgency to construct more housing and have organized a friendly-yet-fierce competition between two construction teams to see who can complete the most homes.

Development Innovations Group offers a good illustration of OPIC’s ability to form partnerships to achieve a greater developmental impact. As the U.S. Government’s development finance institution, OPIC helps private businesses invest in frontier markets and often collaborates with other agencies or NGOs to channel additional investment into projects addressing major social and environmental needs.  As the builders’ contest illustrates, DIG and other OPIC-supported projects have responded quickly to the need in Haiti.

Our delegation also visited the site of Les Mousins d’Haiti, a flour mill that was destroyed in the earthquake and rebuilt with the support of OPIC political risk insurance to Seaboard Corp., which worked through a joint venture to reconstruct and upgrade the massive plant. It was reopened in late 2011 with greater production capacity, more modern machinery and an overall design that will better withstand any future seismic activity.

While it was immensely gratifying to see the ways that OPIC investments were having positive results on the ground, one of the best endorsements of our work came from Haiti’s President, Michel Martelly, who flew by helicopter to meet with our delegation and Ambassador White to discuss the ways to further engage the private sector to advance development. Much of the business activity currently planned is focused around the Caracol Industrial Park in the North, where a power plant, water treatment facility, housing communities and others are planned and are expected to create thousands of jobs and an economic hub outside of the capital city of Port au Prince.

Pictured, from left U.S. Ambassador to Haiti Pamela White; OPIC Board member Naomi Walker; OPIC President and CEO Elizabeth Littlefield; President of Haiti Michel Martelly; OPIC Deputy Chief of Staff, Paula Tufro; OPIC Director of Congressional Affairs, Aysha House-Moshi; OPIC Senior Investment Officer Michael McNulty

For me the trip helped me to understand the business of development and think about ways OPIC could work with the private sector and the NGO community to achieve more. I met with people from the Clinton Global Initiative as well as 60 NGOs to discuss ways they might expand their work beyond basic relief to support economic growth and stability, and the ways OPIC could support those efforts. Relief work is important, especially in the wake of a natural disaster, but more longstanding benefits can be gained by turning over projects to local people or scaling them into sustainable businesses with the help of critical tools such as OPIC financing and political risk insurance.

And that’s exactly what they did during yesterday’s Google+ Hangout, moderated by ONE’s Global Health Director Erin Hohlfelder here in our Washington, D.C., headquarters. Experts from five cities, four countries and three continents joined together for one hour to do everything they could to break down the fight against malaria for activists new to the issue or looking to refresh their knowledge.

Watch the video here:

And man, were they creative! Here’s some of the highlights:

Dr. S. Patrick Kachur, a medical epidemiologist and chief of the malaria branch of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, broke down the science of the disease itself and the tools used to fight it. He even brought a prop to the party, showing viewers how a spraying machine worked. He also addressed the issue of DDT – a hot topic with lots of misconceptions – and its use in helping to eradicate malaria.

Annemarie Meyer, a the program and policy manager from Malaria No More UK in London, talked about the different ways that regular citizens can get involved in the global fight against malaria through activism, and also explained celebrity involvement. She showed an ad of David Beckham championing the issue and discussed the malaria documentary “Mary and Martha,” starring Hillary Swank, but also offered up clear, simple messages for campaigners to use in talking to their elected officials.

Dr. Michael Aidoo, a diagnostics specialist from PMI and CDC joined us from Accra, Ghana to give us an on the ground perspective. He explained the kinds of tools that people use to test for malaria, and walked through the process of training health workers. He shared some amazing photos (which you can view below) from CDC projects on the ground and a moving anecdote about an unsung malaria hero.

Dr. Eric Mouzin, medical epidemiologist for the Roll Back Malaria partnership of the World Health Organization, joined us from Geneva, Switzerland to talk about how our efforts to fight malaria actually get funded. He also talked about the status of the malaria vaccine and implored advocates to push for scaled up malaria financing through the Global Fund and other programs.

The video chat ended with a whirlwind of questions from our ONE members, which were sent via Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and ONE.org. People asked questions like, “How we can empower communities to take active roles in malaria prevention?” “What about DDT?” and “What is working in Africa?”

Take a moment to watch the video in the player above, then leave us a comment below with your thoughts. We’d love to hear from  you!  Special thanks to all our moderators and panelists for joining us in this special World Malaria Day discussion.

Still want to do more? Join Malaria No More in the fight against malaria – and follow ONE on Google+ for more hangouts like these. 

Watch the event in the player below. The video will not go live until 12PM ET/ 4PM GMT. 

Got a question for the moderators? Tweet it using the hashtag #ONEmalariachat.

I’m just going to cut to the chase because I know you’re anxious to help. G8 decision makers will be meeting at a special summit on June 8, a week before the G8, to discuss a plan that they and African leaders introduced last year to achieve food security and nutrition in sub-Saharan Africa. During this event, these leaders will examine progress and unveil new changes to the plan.

This is where you come in. We need YOU start a FOOD REVOLUTION and convince these guys to add measurable commitments to global childhood nutrition to the plan. 

Why? Every year, 2.4 million children die because they’re not getting the right amount of nutrients in their system. The ones who live grow up chronically undernourished – or worse, suffer from irreversible brain damage or long-term illness. When that happens, it sabotages their ability to grow up into healthy adults capable of taking care of themselves and their families.

These numbers are way too high, and they aren’t improving fast enough. Rates of chronic undernutrition in Africa for the past two decades have been hovering at 40 percent. Unless we take action, Africa could be home to even more stunted children in the next decade.

How to Save Children from Malnutrition:

Many of you wonder how to “help the world’s poorest children”. Well, this action that we’re offering you, right here and right now, is what will realistically and directly help kids – not just in Africa, but across the developing world.

Sign our petition NOW and tell world leaders to make measurable commitments to reduce chronic malnutrition for 25 million kids by 2016 so they can reach their full potential.

We know that “measurable commitments” is a really broad statement, but it’s actually a really specific set of goals that ONE has tailored for each G8 decision maker (we’ll send this to them when we deliver your petition signatures). Here in the US, we’re asking President Obama to:

- Double its spending on nutrition in 2014 to a minimum of $200 million a year
- Set a global stunting reduction target for which we’ll be responsible for by 2016
- Launch a review process to create a comprehensive nutrition strategy by the end of 2013
- Appoint a high-level nutrition leader to coordinate across US government agencies to ensure that we reach our goal
- Lead globally in improving the effectiveness of nutrition programs
- Measure what matters for accountability: spending and impact

It’s that time of year. Warmer weather… baseball… finals… and the end of ONE Campus Challenge Season 6. And let me tell you, ONE’s student chapters across the country went out with a bang!

For the third and final challenge of the semester, ONE Campus chapters across the nation brought out their creative side to educate their student bodies on the facts of US foreign assistance. Students hosted a Day of Action on their respective campuses, seeking to debunk the myths and misconceptions about foreign aid – and inspire their campus communities to take action in the process. And the drum roll please…

Our Challenge 3 winner is Clark University! Close runner ups are University of Iowa, Becker University, and University of Texas at El Paso. Congratulations to all of our campus chapters for their incredible work on this challenge.

UTEP member speaking out during their LIGHTS OUT freeze mob Day of Action event on energy poverty.

Becker University’s poster game – post-its with student guesses about US foreign aid. 

Acapella group at Clark University’s coffee house event on energy poverty.          

This month students also submitted their videos for our OCC Bonus challenge.  In this challenge, campus chapters created their own version of a “Man on the Street” video by asking their campus community for their thoughts on foreign aid funding and seeing how people’s views changed once faced with the facts. Brigham Young University – Hawaii, Loyola Marymount, and University of North Carolina – Wilmington made some awesome videos – check out BYUH’s winning video here:

And finally, with all of the points now locked in, we are pleased to announce that our Grand Prize Winners for Season 6, Part II of OCC are University of Texas – El Paso, University of Michigan, University of Arizona and Carthage College. ONE members from these schools will join students from last semester’s winners (BYU Hawaii and University of Virginia) in Washington D.C., for a grand prize experience this summer. We can’t wait to have them here!

Across the board, ONE students pulled off some pretty amazing things this year. ONE student chapters sent 4,500 postcards to the candidates, wrote 3,000 letters, made more than 2,000 calls to Congress, sent more than 500 tweets to Congress, and conducted 74 in-person meetings with Members of Congress. Not only are the numbers incredible, but these collective efforts have made a huge difference for the world’s most vulnerable. And the evidence is astounding: Despite across-the-board cuts to the federal budget last month, funding for The Global Fund was preserved. And elected leaders like Secretary John Kerry, Senator Christopher Coons, President Obama, and many others expressed their strong support for life-saving development programs in recent weeks.

To our campus leaders, you’ve shown once again how impactful students can be in creating real change for the issues we care about. And that’s the thing about ONE Campus – without a doubt, students can and do change the world.

Learn more about the ONE Campus program here, and see how your campus can get involved next year! 

Leave a comment below and say congrats to the winning colleges!