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services to put this wrong to rights immediately. A member of the cabinet woke up in the middle of the night to the sudden realisation that there were not enough people working on the case, and has appointed an International Poverty Comittee to deal with the situation.

Yes, there really is such a committee and it is called: " Global Call to Action Against Poverty. ". It is a world-wide alliance consisting of national coalitions of campaigns to end world poverty and began on 1st January 2005. Remember White Band day? Little rubber bands we wore round our wrists which said: "Make Poverty History". These weren't directly putting food in the mouths of hungry babies but they were helping to raise awareness, making poverty an important news story in a very personalised way.

According to the Guardian newspaper on 22nd February 2008: "The United Nations warned yesterday that it no longer has enough money to keep global malnutrition at bay. This year a dramatic upward surge in world commodity prices, have created a "new face of hunger".."

On the 20th February 2009, the UN announced that poor farmers in Tanzania were to receive a 56 million dollars from a United Nations development branch. As well as that the UN will be funding a 15 million dollar scheme to bolster agricultural productivity in Laos.

So those of us who feel helpless when it comes to making efforts to combat poverty may rest assured that somewhere and in some way there are groups and agencies doing it for us. It may not be head-line news but there is good news out there which can be found with a little time and effort.

Learn more about this author, Fiona Clements.
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