40 Hour Famine – Thank You (2009)

Thank You to all who did the 40 Hour Famine this year :]

Remeber to return all monies to Ms. Alway by September 30th.

Q&A Cafe – Friday 27th of Feburary

Q&A CAFE — ‘Be The Change’

Lead singer of ‘Anberlin’, STEPHEN CHRISTIAN, will be featuring in a Vision Generation Q&A night. Stephen co-founded ‘Faceless International’ and is passionate about speaking out for victims of trafficking and exploitation.

Also featuring:
CAMERON NEIL – Operations Manager (Australia), Fairtrade
MEAGAN PRICE – World Vision Foundation Thailand
AMY SHAND – State Director Vision Generation Victoria

Guest performance:
ANDREW KITCHEN – former lead singer of Antiskeptic

When: Friday, February 27th
Time: 6pm til late – Q&A starts at 7pm sharp
Where: Retro Cafe, 413 Brunswick St, Fitzroy
Cost: $5 – food and drinks can be purchased from Retro
RSVP: vic@vgen.org to secure your place

Q&A nights are pretty chilled evenings, where we can hear stories from inspiring advocates using their talents to make change. Guests share their passions and motivations in a casual interview setting where you can interact and be a part of the discussion. Whether you know a little or a lot about the injustices that shadow our globe, you can be sure to leave challenged and inspired to ‘be the change’ in your own world.

Vgen Summer Challenge

Vision Generation has set the Summer Challenge. There will be prizes for those who have demonstrated that they have completed this four part summer challenge.

Download & print this Summer Challege HERE

Challenge # 1: Meet your Member of Parliament
at their local office & inform them about the issues & the campaign

• Talk to them about:
• human trafficking
• the Don’t Trade Lives campaign and
  your thoughts about the Australian chocolate industry’s inadequate response to the call to end child labour in cocoa harvesting.

Ensure your MP knows that Asia has by far the highest level of individuals trafficked and enslaved, and that those trafficked for labour purposes greatly outweighs those that are trafficked into the sex trade. Tell him/her that you want to see Australia take the lead to end trafficking in our region.

REMINDER: for those of you who met an MP during Trek, please also send that MP a personalised letter of thanks ASAP and cc a copy to us. Include a World Vision’s “Smiles” gift that you have purchased for them as a gesture of thanks. This will work best as purely a thanks and not to ask them for anything!

Challenge # 2 : Help spread the word!
(the Watch Forward Challenge!)

Hundreds of VGenners and tens of thousands of Australians have been shocked to learn the reality of how their chocolate is made: with the aid of child labour and exploitation. But not everyone knows about this yet.

• Watch the clip ‘Big Chocolate – Bubbles of Nothing @ youtube.com/worldvisionstir or on the DTL website
• Share this clip via email to 50 friends and/or colleagues and through your Facebook account
• Challenge them to share your friends to forward it to 50 people they know!

Challenge # 3 : Speak out – Demand Ethical Chocolate

What to do:

• make two phone calls to different stores each week from now until end December. (For telephone numbers of leading supermarkets and department stores, refer to the Action page at DontTradeLives.com.au.)
• Tell your local department store and supermarkets that you’d buy ethical chocolate if they stocked it; and
• Tell your supermarkets that you’d love to see them using Fairtrade cocoa in their own home brands.

Challenge #4: Contact 10 chocolate boutiques

This can be in person or by mail and encourage them to switch to ethical chocolate.
For chocolate boutiques to promote themselves as truly stylish, they require more than fashionability, they must have integrity and quality.

For contact details of your local chocolate boutiques, visit their websites:

• Koko Black www.kokoblack.com.au
• Max Brenner www.maxbrenner.com.au
• San Churro www.sanchurro.com.au
• The Chocolate Room www.thechocolateroom.com.au

Send all your stories and succeses to donttradelives@vgen.org & they will add your story to http://www.vgen.blogspot.com/!

– Source: http://vgen.blogspot.com/2008/12/vgen-summer-challenge.html

Day of Action: ‘TODAY’S ABOLITIONISTS’

A day of action to support your campaign for the abolition of slavery!

Trafficking enslaves 27 million people across the globe. On 23rd September World Vision invites you to

become one of today’s abolitionists and use your skills and talents to stand against this human rights crime.

Don’t Trade Lives campaigners will unite on this Day of Action to inspire and educate each other on child labour in cocoa production and TAKE ACTION by taking the Don’t Trade Lives message to the public.

This is YOUR opportunity to campaign for freedom! Bring along your friends or Vision Group and make a difference!

You will…

• LEARN about Don’t Trade Lives’ asks of Government and corporations as we launch our campaign policies
• TAKE ACTION and BE CREATIVE in our campaign stunt in Camberwell
• DEVELOP your public speaking skills
• LOBBY Industry and Government to increase their efforts to eliminate child labour
• HAVE FUN with other like-minded campaigners!

Day of Action details
Date | Tuesday 23rd September 2008 (Term 3 Holidays)
Time | 9am – 5.30pm
Venue | Camberwell Baptist Church, 460 Riversdale Rd, Camberwell Junction
Cost | $10 (includes lunch, refreshments and conference materials)
Download the registration form here and send to events@vgen.org (it includes a billeting package for regional delegates)

VGROUP COMPETITION!

See how many VGroup members or friends from your network you can bring along to win a fairtrade chocolate hamper for your next VGroup/Team meeting!

Today’s Abolitionists is a fantastic opportunity for people who have supported the 40 Hour Famine and Don’t Trade Lives, Vision Group Leaders and members

GetStirred New Member Night

‘GetStirred’ New Member Night
Date: Thursday 4th September
Time: 6pm-8pm
Venue: World Vision HQ, 1 Vision Drive, Burwood East
Cost: $5 for dinner

Join other new VGen members for an inspiring info night where you will…

• Get to know like-minded others
• Hear about World Vision’s work in Australia and overseas
• Learn about our campaigns like Don’t Trade Lives
• Find out how YOU can act against poverty!

Download the flyer for more info
RSVP to vic@vgen.org
(you can request GetStirred online if you’re unable to attend)

Be there!

Don’t Trade Lives

Don’t Trade Lives is a new campaign by World Vision that aims to  unite Australians against human trafficking and slavery. Human trafficking is a modern day slave trade. The buying and selling of people for exploitative labour is the third biggest crime in the world today behind drugs and arms. Every sector of Australian society can impact on human trafficking in our region. Join us in telling Australia “Don’t Trade Lives!”

Don’t Trade Lives exists to unite Australians against human trafficking and slavery. Together we will:

• Prevent people being trafficked
• Advocate for trafficked victims
• Tackle the causes of trafficking and slavery

Prevention

Trafficking is a human rights crime. Don’t Trade Lives aims to reduce the vulnerability of people in communities to becoming victims of trafficking. Key components include awareness, education, strengthening communities, and promotion of an individual’s rights.

Don’t Trade Lives encourages education for at-risk communities about safe transit and labour migration to prevent the spread of trafficking at source, transit and destination countries. This must happen both across and within countries where trafficking exists, including Australia.

Human trafficking throughout our region is overwhelmingly linked to labour exploitation and unsafe labour migration. Don’t Trade Lives recognizes the fundamental human pursuit to create a better life for individuals, their families and their children, while working to ensure that this happens safely.

Advocate for victims

Don’t Trade Lives advocates for victims of trafficking. Virtually every country, including Australia, is implicated in the trade in human lives, either as a place of recruitment, transit or the destination of trafficked victims.

In Australia, Don’t Trade Lives calls on all levels of government to enhance their responses to the needs of victims of trafficking and improve their access to support services.

Don’t Trade Lives urges the Australian Government to lead the way by developing a detailed strategy that works with communities and governments in Australia and the region to adopt a human rights approach to trafficking.

Tackle the Causes

Many factors can make a person vulnerable to trafficking, including a lack of skills, lack of migrant protection and poverty. Don’t Trade Lives aims to tackle all the causes of trafficking and slavery, including helping to end poverty.

A comprehensive response to trafficking should include more and better aid, including sustained poverty alleviation programs, along with greater efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Read more about the Millennium Development Goals

Australia should lift its aid budget to at least 0.7% of national income by no later than 2015 and outline plans for incremental increases that will see our commitments fulfilled.

In every aspect of our lives, we can all act to eliminate trafficking and slavery in our lifetime.

• As consumers, we need to be aware of what we buy and how it gets here. We should ask questions of industry and if we don’t get satisfactory answers, we should keep asking!
• As socially responsible workers, we must encourage our workplaces to advocate for change in the countries where they work, buy and source products, as well as contribute to programs that support people who are victims of trafficking and slavery in those countries.
• As concerned citizens, we can encourage the Australian government to support victims in Australia with compassion, respect and adequate services.
• As good neighbours, the Australian government should take a leading role in our region to adhere to best practices and polices for prevention, protection, and reintegration of trafficking victims.
• As global citizens, we must call on the Australian Government to increase its support for holistic and comprehensive poverty alleviation programs that help prevent trafficking and protect vulnerable communities. Australia should contribute its fair share towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

About this site

Don’t Trade Lives encourages you to learn more about the issues so you can help inform others and take practical action that will make a difference. Your actions can help change the lives of the tens of millions who are vulnerable and the growing numbers who are newly trafficked each day.

We want to hear from you! Tell us what you’re doing, what you think of Don’t Trade Lives and what you’d like to see included. By connecting with each other, we can have the greatest impact! If you have any news to share, questions to ask or suggestions for us, please use the Contact Us section.

About World Vision

World Vision is a Christian relief, development and advocacy organisation dedicated to working with children, families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice.

Last year, we helped more than 20.4 million people around the world through 735 projects in 62 countries, including work with Indigenous communities here in Australia.

– Source: http://www.donttradelives.com.au/dtl/aboutUs/default.aspx

Our Vision

Hey guys,

This is Glen Waverley Secondary College’s Vision Group blog. We are a group of passionate young people, who campaign relentlessly and speak out for those who can’t, because we believe our generation can make poverty history.

Our mission is to ‘Inspire, Educate and Empower, Young People In The Fight Against Global Poverty And Injustice’.

We are part of the Vision Generation who are a National youth movement of World Vision Australia.