Burkina Faso

Justice Matters founding member, Sara recently spent a few days in Burkina Faso with Josephine, an amazing 13 year old. This is her story:

"Five News’ Peter Lane reports from Burkina Faso as new figures expose the scale of world hunger."

Shared from the Justice Matters Facebook Page

Enough Food IF...

On Saturday 8 June David Cameron hosts a hunger summit. This is our big moment, our chance to make our voices heard and to push the G8 to take action on hunger. Together we will make sure David Cameron goes to Northern Ireland with our demands ringing in his ears. We want the G8 leaders to take action on aid, land,tax and transparency - the four big IFs needed to help end hunger.

Join us and make your voice heard at the Big IF in London's Hyde Park on Saturday 8 June.

http://bigiflondon-enoughfoodneutral.eventbrite.co.uk/

Shared from the Justice Matters Facebook Page

Live Below the Line

As I wrote last week, from this Monday, a number of us will be participating in Live Below the Line - a campaign intended to raise and awareness and funds for the 1.4 billion people around the world who live below the extreme poverty line. For five days we will be joining many others across the UK and beyond in spending no more than £1 a day on food and drink. As you can imagine, this is quite a feat, especially with food prices going up and up and a great way to talk to friends and colleagues about food poverty and social justice.

Doing our shop for Live Below the Line 2011

There are different ways to undertake the challenge: you can walk into a supermarket with a fiver and buy everything for your week with just that one note, or you can work out how much you're going to use of different items and calculate the cost of individual portions to reach your £5 limit. Both methods have their merits, so feel free to do either. If you choose, you can get people to sponsor you to undertake the challenge, and/or you could give the extra money you would usually have spent on your food shop to a charity like Tearfund, The Salvation Army International Development or Christian Aid who support international development.

To help with your LTBL menu planning, you might like to have a look at A Girl Called Jack website (thanks, Dawn) which has lots of budget meal suggestions. Victoria and I are going to  give her carrot, cumin and kidney bean burgers a go - let us know if you try any of the others!

Are you taking part? Let us know if you are - maybe share a photo of your shopping list or till receipt, or any budget menu ideas that others could try, and remember to tell your friends why you're lunch looks a bit different this week - you never know, they might be inspired to find out more about social justice and even come along to Justice Matters with you!

As well as all that, we will having our usual first Wednesday in the month gathering this Weds (1 May), when we will be chatting more about the practicalities of getting involved with seeking social justice. We will be at the Bohemia from 8pm - you can decide whether to take an evening off LBTL and buy a drink or just stick tap water...

IF, the UN and a mysterious request

Great to see lots of you at our gathering last Wednesday and special thanks to Natalie and Ian for the fascinating ideas and insights on Fairtrade and ethical consumerism.

At that session, Victoria highlighted the Enough Food... IF Campaign and challenged us to arrange a meeting with our local MPs to raise the campaign with them. Following that discussion, Victoria has identified some resources to help us with that challenge. These include a briefing note to share with your MP (and handy for reminding you what the campaign is about too!) and a longer Executive Summary. 

Victoria and I have set up an opportunity to meet with Theresa Villiers on Saturday 9th March for those living in Chipping Barnet, while Dave is speaking to Mike Freer's office for those in Finchley & Golders Green. We'd like people to come along with us and will be preparing for those meetings at our next pub session (this coming Weds, 8pm at The Catcher in the Rye, Finchley Central).

Two other things to flag: 

Firstly, that our esteemed member Ann-Marie is speaking at the UN in the coming days. We're very excited that our local Network has such a wide reach! If you're the praying type, do remember her this week.

Secondly, hang on to your plastic tubs (of the sort that fruit and veg sometimes come in) and bring them along to the next cafe session, where they'll be put to good use...

See you again soon!

Enough Food IF

The world produces enough food for everyone, but not everyone has enough food.

We can change this in 2013. IF we act together, we can make this year the beginning of the end for global hunger.



This year, many of the world’s most powerful leaders will meet in the UK. They must change the future for millions of people who live with the day to day struggle against hunger. But that will only happen IF we get together and make them act.

Justice Matters is proud to be involved in supporting this exciting new multi-agency campaign to bring an end to hunger around the world. Watch this space for opportunities to play your part. In the meantime, here's a video from the launch event...

Food, glorious food!

Food plays a huge role in our society. Eating together is a sign of hospitality and friendship, popular (and sometimes colourful) chefs are celebrated in our media, and programmes like Come Dine With Me and the Great British Bake Off are hugely popular.

Food is something that we love and often take for granted. We learnt this week that vast amounts of food is being wasted by consumers in the developed world. Meanwhile, we know that there are many people around the world - 870 million according to the World Food Programme - who go to bed hungry day in, day out. This inequality is truly shocking.

Over the coming few months, we will be looking at food and how it relates to justice. We will be exploring a range of topics - from hunger in the developing world to grow you own in the UK, from Fairtrade and unjust trade barriers, to Foodbanks and poverty closer to home.

Both the Old and New Testament of the Bible speak regularly about the issue of food justice, including guidelines to benefit those in need at harvest time, to strong words for those who seek to cheat the hungry out of their resources and those who embrace religion but lack a heart of compassion for those in need. We will be looking at some of these verses as we learn about the facts and seeing how faith and justice are inextricably linked.

Other charities are also focussing on the issue of food at this time, so we will be looking to get involved with Tearfund's new campaign, the Live Below the Line challenge and other opportunities to make a practical dent in this injustice.

It all begins this Wednesday at Coffee Republic from 7:30pm. We're kicking off the series with a guest speaker from Friends of the Earth and a practical activity to have a go at. As you can probably tell, we're really excited about this new theme and the gatherings we have planned, so we hope to see you at Coffee Republic or the Bohemia soon.

Oh, and to anyone fasting this week as part of the St Bs week of prayer and fasting, you might think its a little inconsiderate of us to be doing all this talk of food while you're trying to avoid it. But just consider this, as God says through the prophet Isaiah (58 v6-7):

"Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?"

So there you go. See you on Wednesday! 

A simple truth - Tearfund

This is a great two minute animation on corruption in the mining industry and what we can do about it.

Find out more: http://www.tearfund.org/en/get_involved/campaign/unearth/a_simple_truth/

Shared from the Justice Matters Facebook Page

Join The Secretary of State for the Environment, Caroline Spelman MP, and other influential leaders to debate sustainable development and Rio +20

Sara has highlighted an interesting event that is taking place next Wednesday at Methodist Central Hall. This is not a usual evening for JM gatherings, so some of you will have other commitments, but if any of you would like to join us in going along, please let Sara know so she can arrange seats. Alternately, contact Tearfund directly and we'll see you there! Some information about the event is below.

"Ahead of the UN Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) in June 2012, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Progressio and Tearfund are organising a public discussion, considering the distinctive arguments and solutions offered by Christian perspectives to the vital topics for debate at Rio+20. 

The event will take place on Wednesday 23rd May in Central Hall Westminster, London SW1H 9NH (Tube: Westminster, St James) at 6.30pm."