Hugh's Current Work
Project
Eight Millennium Development Goals were developed in 2000 with the objective of improving the lives of the world's poorest people by 2015. We have made great gains - more babies are receiving life-saving immunizations, more kids are in school and more people have access to safe water than ever before.
Despite these impressive gains, 1.4 billion people, roughly one-fifth of the world's inhabitants, continue to live in extreme poverty.
To achieve our goals and become the generation that eradicates extreme poverty, we need a unified movement of people around the world. The Global Poverty Project will catalyse this movement by creating a feature slideshow and film.
The Global Poverty Project team is creating a slideshow presentation and film that will communicate the realities of extreme poverty and what can be done about it by everyday people around the world.
The slideshow presentation and the film will work in tandem with, and leverage, the current momentum in civil society campaigns on extreme poverty. To make sure that we get it right, we are working in close collaboration with NGOs, government, multilateral agencies, academics and civil society in the research phase of the project.
The tools produced will educate and serve as a catalyst to tackle extreme poverty and achieve the Millennium Development Goals. The Global Poverty Project will do so by reaching out to people in their communities with presentations or viewings of the film, in doing so reframing the media debate on poverty.
Advocacy
Worldwide the project will:
Reach 50,000,000+ people through media and publicity, raising awareness of extreme poverty
Educate 200,000+ people through live presentations, deepening and reframing their view of extreme poverty
Engage 50,000+ citizens globally to take direct action on extreme poverty
The Team
Hugh Evans was Young Australian of the year in 2004. He was the founder of the Oaktree Foundation and one of the key leaders behind the successful Australian MAKEPOVERTYHISTORY campaign, which secured a commitment from the Australian government to increase foreign aid to 0.5% of GNI by 2015. Hugh holds a law and science degree and is undertaking a Masters in International Relations at the University of Cambridge, UK. Simon Moss (General Manager) is an expert in management of major cause-related and community education initiatives. He holds a Masters in Development Studies (Honours), and was previously Chief Operations Officer at the Oaktree Foundation. Erin Deviney (Project Coordinator) is a former Research Director at Northstar Research Partners, where she managed and executed market research projects for a range of blue-chip clients across the retail, packaged goods, automotive, food & beverage, not for profit, and financial services industries. Erin holds a Bachelor Economics (Honours) from Queen's University in Canada and is currently undertaking a Masters in Community Development. Dr Robbie Peters (Lead Researcher) is also a lecturer in anthropology at La Trobe University. He has previously lectured at the Australian National University. Robbie's research focus has been in Indonesia where he has spent many years living in poor urban neighbourhoods. Robbie is also finalising a book on Indonesia's second largest city, Surabaya. Richard Fleming (Australian Activation Manager) comes from a background in business and management consulting. Richard has recently returned from Bangladesh where he was the Project Director of non-profit schools in the slums of Dhaka and previously the ICT Director of the Bangladesh Government's Rural Development Board. Richard holds a Bachelor of Business IT (Honours) from UNSW. Wei Soo (Project Manager) comes from a background in tax consulting and tax litigation, having previously worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers. Wei has considerable experience in social justice related causes, having held senior positions within the Oaktree Foundation. He is admitted to practice as a barrister and solicitor in the Supreme Court of Victoria, Australia. Priti Prajapati (Researcher) graduated in Bsc International Management with French from the University of Manchester and went on to undertake a traineeship at the European Commission Directorate General Enterprise and Industry. With a growing interest in development, Priti then worked as Project Coordinator at ERTICO, managing European Commission funded projects for EU cooperation with India on road safety and transport development. Priti took her experience of EU-India relations to work as head of office for the President of the European Parliament's Delegation for Relations with India, and British Member of European Parliament. Priti is currently undertaking a Masters of Development at University of Sydney, Australia. Franklin Obeng-Odoom (Researcher) graduated with First Class Honours in Land Economy from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana. In 2006, he was one of only three people to win the British Commonwealth Scholarship to University College London, where he studied Development and Planning. Recently Franklin won the University of Sydney International Scholarship to pursue doctoral research in Political Economy. Urbanisation, housing, the political economy of land and decentralisation are an integral part of Franklin's research in development planning. He has previously worked as a Land Economist at KOAconsult, Ghana. Kim Williamson (Researcher) studied interdisciplinary environmental science, development studies and Asian Studies at the Australian National University. During this time, she spent three years overseas studying, researching and working in the NGO sector in rural and metropolitan Thailand and Indonesia. She recently completed an honours thesis on sustainability in disaster response and the humanitarian industry.
