who we are

Organisations

The Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) is a growing alliance of trade unions, community groups, faith groups, women and youth organisations, NGOs and other campaigners working together across more than 100 national platforms. GCAP is calling for action from the world's leaders to meet their promises to end poverty and inequality. The white band is our symbol and expression of solidarity against poverty.

Comic Relief is a UK organisation whose vision is a just world free from poverty. Our mission is to drive positive change through the power of entertainment. We do this by:
- Raising money from the general public by actively involving them in events and projects that are innovative and fun.
- Informing, educating, raising awareness and promoting social change.
- Allocating the funds we raise in a responsible and effective way to a wide range of charities which we select after careful research.

Oxfam International is a confederation of 13 like-minded organizations working together, and with partners and allies around the world. We believe that we can help end poverty and injustice, as part of global movement for change. Visit Oxfam's website to find out more about our work and how to contact an Oxfam nearest you.

Save the Children is the world’s independent children’s rights organisation. We’re outraged that millions of children are still denied proper healthcare, food, education and protection and we’re determined to change that.

Save the Children UK is a member of the International Save the Children Alliance, transforming children’s lives in more than 100 countries.

Launch Partners

YouTube is the world's largest online video community, where people can watch, share and discover originally-created video content. YouTube's Nonprofit Program allows qualifiying organizations to receive increased exposure and functionality on the site, enabling them to broadcast their messages to a global audience.

Supporters

Angelique Kidjo
Angelique is a UNICEF Ambassador and an Oxfam Campaigner. A globally renowned grammy award winning world music singer she is a passionate and hugely committed advocate for the poor. Angelique was born in Benin and now lives in NY and Paris. She has just set up her own Batonga Foundation supporting young girls in Africa to receive an education www.kidjo.com.

Annie Lennox
One of the finest and most outstanding musical voices of our time, singer, songwriter and campaigner, Annie Lennox is celebrated as an innovator, an iconoclast, and a symbol of enduring excellence.
She fronted the Eurythmics with Dave Stewart and they went on to sell over 75 million albums, and achieved over 20 international hits across the world.
Annie Lennox is an Oxfam Global Ambassador and a tireless campaigner on the issue of HIV/AIDS and its impact on women and children’s lives.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Desmond Tutu was born in Klerksdorp, South Africa, in 1931, son of a schoolteacher and a domestic worker. The name of Bishop Tutu became synonymous with that of the SACC as he became the leader of the crusade for justice and racial conciliation in South Africa. In 1984, his contribution to the cause of racial justice in South Africa was recognised when he received the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1995 President Nelson Mandela appointed Archbishop Tutu to chair South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. He is also a member of the Elders.

Emmanuel Jal
Emmanuel Jal was born in war-torn Sudan, and was taken from his family, sent to fight with the rebel army in Sudan's bloody civil war. By the time he was 13, he was a veteran of two civil wars.
To help ease the pain of what he had experienced, Emmanuel started singing. Emmanuel Jal has won worldwide acclaim for his unique style of hip hop with its message of peace and reconciliation born out of his experiences as a child soldier in Sudan.

Fergie
Fergie, is an American pop, R&B, hip hop and dance singer-songwriter, rapper, fashion designer, model, philanthropist, and actress. She is a vocalist for the hip hop/pop group the Black Eyed Peas, as well as a solo artist, having released her debut album, The Dutchess, in September 2006.

Jeffrey Sachs
Jeffrey D. Sachs is the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is also Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
From 2002 to 2006, he was Director of the UN Millennium Project and Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary- General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals, the internationally agreed goals to reduce extreme poverty, disease, and hunger by the year 2015.

John Butler
Ten years ago in 1998 John Butler was busking on the streets of Fremantle, Western Australia. In 2007 the John Butler trio won 2 ARIA awards for their album Grand National. Butler owns and operates his own record label- Jarrah Records. Butler is also receiving recognition for his innovative arts grant fund, called JB Seed, which he oversees with his partner Daniella Caruana.

John Legend
John Legend, is a Grammy award winning American soul singer, songwriter, and pianist. His musical interest started at the age of 3 when his grandmother began teaching him to play gospel piano. By the time he was 7 years old, Legend was singing with the church choir and taking lessons in classical music. Legend's lead vocals on the group's recording of Prince's "One of Us" propelled the song to critical acclaim.

Khalid Abdalla
Khalid Abdalla is an actor born in Britain to Egyptian parents. Khalid played the lead role in 'The Kite Runner' directed by Marc Forster, and Ziad Jarrah in 'United 93', directed by Paul reengrass. He's just finished shooting his second film with Paul Greengrass, 'Green Zone' in Morocco and London opposite Matt Damon. He's now producing and acting in an independent
film called 'In the Last Days of the City' that will shoot in Cairo at the end of the year. He lives in London.

Kristin Davis
Kristin Davis, star of Emmy award-winning HBO television show, Sex and the City, has been supporting Oxfam since 2004, and has travelled on behalf of Oxfam to learn about their work in South Africa and Uganda. Kristin met with women's groups and community-based organizations whose work focuses on the response to the HIV epidemic. She is supporting their cause for better access to treatment and is committed to carrying their message to a global audience.

Kumi Naidoo
Dr. Kumi Naidoo is one of the founders of GCAP and now a Co-Chair. Born in South Africa, Kumi Naidoo became involved in the South African liberation struggle at the age of 15. He was deeply involved in neighbourhood organization, youth work in his community, the underground movement, and mass mobilizations against South Africa's apartheid regime. Kumi holds a D.Phil in Politics from Magdalen College, Oxford and has published and spoken widely on issues relating to civil society, education and resistance to apartheid.

Maggie Q
Maggie Q is an American actress and former fashion model. She has acted in numerous movies including Mission: Impossible III alongside Tom Cruise.

Mary Robinson
Mary Robinson is the President of Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative. She served as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997 to 2002 and as President of Ireland from 1990-1997.
She is a member of the Elders. She is Chair of the Council of Women World Leaders and Vice President of the Club of Madrid. She chairs the Fund for Global Human Rights and is Honorary President of Oxfam International and is Patron of the International Community of Women Living with AIDS (ICW). She is chair of the GAVI Fund Executive Committee and Vice-chair of the GAVI Fund Board.
She is a professor of practice at Columbia University and member of the Advisory Board of the Earth Institute and Extraordinary Professor at the University of Pretoria in South Africa. She serves as Chancellor of Dublin University.

Mary Walsh
Mary Walsh is Canada’s premier political satirist. Mary is best known for her work in one of Canada's most successful television programs "This Hour Has 22 Minutes", portraying such memorable characters as Marg Delahunty, Miss Eulalia, Dakey Dunn, and one of the four Quinlan quintuplets. Mary has done extensive work in theatre as a performer, writer and director. She has starred in a number of feature films, including Secret Nation, New Waterford Girl, Mambo Italiano and Young Triffie’s Been Made Away With.

Mel B
Melanie Brown, aka “Mel B” of the worldwide sensation singing group “The Spice Girls”, is a chart-topping musical artist, actress, author, television personality and groundbreaking entrepreneur who is set to launch her own fashion line.
As a recording artist, Mel B’s achievements with the Spice Girls are legendary: 55 million records sold worldwide, nine number one singles in the UK, 11 gold records as well as a total of 24 platinum and multi-platinum records. Mel B will soon introduce her signature Catty Couture fashion line.

Mischa Barton
London born actress Mischa Barton became a Save the Children supporter in 2007, supporting Save the Children's Rewrite the Future campaign. Rewrite the Future is Save the Children's first global campaign involving all 28 members of the Save the Children Alliance.
Mischa Barton visited a school supported by Save the Children in South Africa. “It was really sad to see the living conditions of these children. I realised that there are simple things that you can do to make a difference in their lives.”

Missy Higgins
Passionate and sincere, Australian singer-songwriter Missy Higgins is a 24-year-old Melbourne native and has enjoyed phenomenal success in her homeland, and a growing fanbase in the U.S.
Missy Higgins began her music career singing standards with her older brother's band when she was just 13. She was thrust into the limelight in 2001 when she won a national songwriting competition run by an influential national alternative radio network while still in high school.

Queen Rania Al Abdullah
Since her marriage to His Majesty King Abdullah ibn Al Hussein (then Prince), in 1993, Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan has been an outspoken philanthropic advocate and a promoter of advancing health and educational opportunities in Jordan and across the globe.

Rahul Bose
Rahul Bose is an Indian actor, screenwriter, film director, social activist, and rugby union player. Bose assisted in the relief efforts in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands after the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. As a result of this work, Bose launched the Andaman and Nicobar Scholarship Initiative through his NGO, The Foundation.
He became the first Indian Oxfam global ambassador in 2007. Bose has given lectures on gender equality and human rights at Oxford and during the 2004 World Youth Peace Summit.

Sergio Mendes
Sérgio Mendes is a Grammy Award-winning Brazilian musician. He has released over thirty-five albums, and plays bossa nova heavily crossed with jazz and funk. Mendes lived in Brazil during the momentous era between the late ‘50s and the early ‘60s when the samba-based bossa nova was born. In fact, he was one of the first practitioners of the new genre, together with composer Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Sylvia Borren
Sylvia Borren was elected Co-Chair of GCAP in 2007. She joined Oxfam Novib in1994 as Director of the Project Department and served as Executive Director from 1999 to January 2008. She also chairs the New Dialogue (a Dutch platform of civil society organisations) and is a co-founder of the Dutch Social Forum. She leads the community arts project called the Poverty Requiem which was launched in 2007. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Education and Religious Studies and a Master’s degree in Education.

Will.i.am
Will.i.am, is an Emmy Award-winning American musician, specializing as a hip hop musician, dancer, songwriter and founding member and frontman of Black Eyed Peas. On his own, will.i.am has established himself as one of music’s top producers.

Wyclef Jean

In the 20 years since first meeting his fellow Fugees cofounders -- Lauryn Hill and Prakazrel ("Pras") Michel -- and 10 years since launching his prolific solo, Wyclef Jean has effortlessly crossed genres, generations and geographic boundaries as a musical goodwill ambassador and a diplomat for positive cultural evolution.
In 2005 Wyclef Jean created the non-profit foundation Yéle Haiti (www.yele.org) to provide aid and assistance to that impoverished nation.