By: Priscila Néri, Posted: Oct 17 08

Global

Education, Food & health & development, Poverty

GCAP, MDGs, Millennium Development Goals, Poverty, Stand Up and Take Action

In 2006, the first global call for citizens of the world to Stand Up against poverty mobilized 24 million people in 87 countries, setting a Guinness World Record.

In 2007, that record was shattered when 43.7 million people in 127 countries joined the Global Call for Action Against Poverty in the "biggest 24-hour mobilization ever recorded in history on any one issue."

This year promises an even bigger response. More than 2000 Stand Up events have already been registered in over 100 countries and nearly 100 million people are expected to join the call to action.

This year's events started with 520 people at a school assembly about global poverty at Nayland College in Nelson, New Zealand, and will go on throughout the weekend in all continents.

A primary school from Tamil Nadu, India, brings us one of the first videos from Stand Up and Take Action 2008:

In the Philippines, local organizations also organized this demonstration in front of the Department of Agriculture:

Many many other events are planned throughout the weekend: from a solidarity walk with physically handicapped people on the African island of Mauritius to the planting of 1000 trees at the Pine Mount Primary School in Afghanistan to a picnic in Bloudan, Syria, and a street fair in Lambayeque, Peru. Other randomly selected highlights include:

- landmine victims standing together with civil society and government representatives in Khett Batdambang, Cambodia, to sign a People's Treaty to Ban Cluster Munitions;
- 500,000 Palestinian refugee children from all the schools in the West Bank and Gaza Strip will stand together to protest their own poverty through activities like writing, painting, and singing
- 20 KENGO members of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) Lorian Farm camp in the Rift Valley of Kenya will commit to getting 20 other people each to stand with them against poverty;

(More Stand Up 2008 highlights on this OneWorld blog post)

Why Stand Up? Here's Vernetta Lopez, from ONE Singapore:

What must world leaders do to fight poverty successfully? Listen to Kasaine Nalangu Ene, from Kenya:

What can YOU do?
1) Learn more about the Poverty Hearings that have been taking place across the world over the past year by watching this GCAP video and reading Chris Michael's post;
2) Find a Stand Up Event in your area or register your own event;
3) Join the Global Call to Action Against Poverty;
4) Add your voice to the "In My Name" campaign!