July 15, 2023 • 29 mins
Ryan Gorman hosts an iHeartRadio nationwide special featuring Hugh Evans, Co-Founder & CEO of Global Citizen. Hugh Evans joins the show to discuss the work Global Citizen does to eradicate extreme poverty around the world, including the impact of their Global Citizen Festival, which features a call to action that pushes participants to make a difference in their local communities and brings artists together to raise funding for essential programs utilized in impoverished nations.
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(00:00):
Welcome to iHeartRadio Communities, a publicaffairs special focusing on the biggest issues impacting
you. This week, here's RyanGorman. Thanks so much for joining us
here on iHeartRadio Communities. I'm RyanGorman, and we have a really important
conversation lined up for you. Overseven hundred million people across the world live
(00:21):
in extreme poverty. Regions across Africa, Asia and Latin America are the ones
most impacted, and unfortunately, we'veseen an increase in global poverty for the
first time since nineteen ninety eight,following the COVID nineteen pandemic. Now,
if you're wondering what exactly global povertymeans, it's defined by the World Bank
as the share of the world's populationliving on less than a dollar and ninety
(00:45):
cents a day. One organization workingtirelessly to tackle this issue is Global Citizen,
and right now I'm joined by cofounder and CEO Hugh Evans. You
can learn more about all the vitalwork they do at global citizen dot org.
Hugh, thanks so much for takingthe time to come on the show,
and let's start with the backstory tohow your organization was first created.
(01:08):
Well, firstly, thank you Ryanfor having me on your show, and
it's great to connect with you.Global Citizen was born based on that belief
that Nelson Mandela said when he saidthat overcoming poverty is not to suggest here
of charity, but it's an actof justice. He said, like slavery
and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It's man made and can be overcome
(01:30):
and eradicated by the actions of humanbeings. And really it all started in
twenty two thousand and six when theG twenty World leaders were coming through Melbourne,
where I'm from in Australia, andme and my mate Dan had this
idea to run this small concert becausewe were trying to convince the Australian government
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and the G twenty leaders to increasetheir investment to combat hunger all around the
world. All my life, ifI've been passionate about the eradication of poverty
from living in the Philippines, inIndia and South Africa when I was a
kid, and we saw this opportunitywith the G twenty in town to try
to make a difference, and sowe hosted this small concert and one day
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it all of a sudden blew upwhen we got a phone call from Bono
from YouTube, and Bono said,in his thick Irish accent, he said,
hey boys, I'm coming to Melbourne. I want to perform at your
Make Poverty History concert. And atthe time we thought it was a prank
call. We didn't believe it thatI know, but sure enough he was
(02:36):
serious and he asked Pearl Jam toperform with him, and they created,
obviously an amalgamation of you two andPearl Jam. They called it Ujam and
they came on stage first on ourbill and sang Rocking in the Free World
by Nearly Young and it went viralin the days before viral was a thing,
and we ended up standing on amillion Australians behind our Make Poverty History
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campaign, and we convinced the governmentthe following year to double foreign aid,
so we raised six point two billiondollars in new funding for the world's poor.
And off the back of that,we got a phone call from the
United Nations here in New York andthey said, you know, we've seen
what you've done in Australia. Couldyou build this youth movement all around the
(03:21):
world. And me and my friendSimon, we went to watch an Inconvenient
Truth by Al Gore, and wesaid, wasn't it great how our Gore,
you know, talk so simply aboutthe challenges of climate change. You
know, could we do something similaron global poverty? And so we started
with this small presentation with the flag. So we used to take around to
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college campuses. And then we hadthis dream a senior if we could pull
off a concert on the Great Lawnof Central Park in New York City.
But there was this big problem becausewhen we when we were in New York,
everyone's like, no, no,no, you can't do it on
the Great Lawn. You know,no one's done it on the Great Lawn
on a week since Simon and GarthUncle back in nineteen eighty three. It's
not going to happen. And sowe just kept getting no, no,
(04:05):
no, no no. So oneday we managed to get a meeting with
Mary Bloomberg's team and they're like,yeah, you can do it, but
you have to come up with aninnovative way to give away all the tickets
for free, and you have toget the world's biggest artists. And I
remember we went over to meet withthe Foo Fighters and they were the first
(04:26):
to sign on and their manager,John Silva, but were This is how
we were such a startup in thosedays. We were working out of a
broom closet type office and Lafayette Streetin New York with literally a couple of
volunteers and nothing else. And wewere a month out from the festival and
we hadn't raised all the money,and we had no headliner because the Foo
fighters said that sixty thousand people theywanted to have another big headliner. And
(04:50):
this is why I do believe thatsometimes miracles can happen, because I'll never
forget the day when we were inla and some in the Redstone, you
know, for the late head ofViacom. He called us and said,
come come to my house, andhe literally wrote a check on the spot
for over a million dollars to helpus make it happen. And then half
(05:12):
an hour later, Nearly Young calledus from Hawaii saying he wanted to headline
the first year. And I waslike wow. And so we were already
in August and our festival takes placesand know every September, and amazingly,
you know, a month later,sixty thousand people came and were able to
secure commitment commitments of over a billiondollars to support our mission of eradicating poverty.
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And the cool thing about Global Citizenis that none of that money that's
announced on stage goes to us.We give it directly to all the charities
that we support. And we thoughtthat year one was going to be the
end of it because we were sotired at the end of pulling it off.
But the day after we got acall from Stevie Wonder and his agent
Rob Liked, and Stevie's like,you know, boys, I saw what
(05:57):
you did. I want to headlineYear two and you said, with all
respectness to Wander, there is noYear two as well, there is now
and so that's that's why Global Citizengrew to now become the largest movement of
its kind around the world. Youknow, we now have millions of members
all around the world. The festivalhas gone to South Africa with Beyonce and
(06:19):
Jay Z for Mandela's one hundredth anniversary, which we've been to Germany. We've
been most recently in Paris with obviouslytwo years ago with Ed Shearon and with
Elton Johnaman this year with Billie Eilishand Lenny Kravitz and her. So we're
thrilled that the movement has now becometruly global and as as inspiring young people
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all around the world. But we'vealways stayed true to that idea that you
have to earn your way into thefestival. You can't buy tickets to Global
Citizen. It's eighty percent of thetickets are given away for free in exchange
for your actions, and you usethe Global Citizen an apt to take action
because we believe, as Mandela said, that our collective voice is so much
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more powerful than just our individual voice, and so we use the power of
that collective voice to convince world leadersto make multi billion dollar pledges because you
and I know that extreme poverty isa three point five trillion dollars challenge.
You know it's not going to besold through a bunch of black tie gala
dinners. That's never going to makethe difference. We need. Such an
(07:28):
incredible story. I have to goback though to the very beginning, when
when you're just starting with this concertin Australia, How did Barno get wind
of it? Well, it wasactually in the day when my space was
still and I remember, I rememberthat I remember still the lady from my
Space. And then with Rebecca Horn, we met with her in Sydney and
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she agreed to put global it wascalled Make Poverty History back in those days.
She agreed to put the Make PovertyHistory confort on the front page of
my Space and so everyone everyone like, our numbers of sign ups were huge,
and so Bono heard about it becauseobviously he was, you know,
touring with you two around that time, and you know, his manager Paul
(08:13):
McGinnis at that stage reached out andwas like and was like, yeah,
Bonno wants to do this, andwe're like, wow. We just didn't
believe it because I was I rememberI was in the law library. I
was studying law at the time,and I was like, now, this
isn't real. We all thought itwas a prank call. But sure enough,
you know, Bono really has been, as you know that the godfather
(08:35):
of this movement. And you know, he and I have worked together,
most recently on our Stand Up forUkraine campaign last year after Russia's unjust invasion
of Ukraine. Bono was the firstto call and we mobilized the international community
to come together to raise over sixbillion dollars to support refugees fleeing the war
(08:58):
in Ukraine. So his coman throughhis own one campaign and everything he's done
with Red is enduring, and sowe're happy to be in a bigger alliance
to change the world. I'm RyanGorman, joined by Hugh Evans, co
founder and CEO of Global Citizen.You can learn more all about their very
(09:18):
important work at global citizen dot org. This mission it's very personal to you.
You can tell as you talk aboutthe work you're doing. Do you
mind sharing with us a bit aboutyour personal experience with poverty? Yeah.
So I grew up in just middleclass Melbourne in Australia, and there was
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an experience that changed my life.When I was fourteen years old. I'd
started raising money for an organization inAustralia and their work to alleviate poverty around
the world. And I was avery eager young kid, so I raised
as much money as I could andevent I became the highest fundraising kid in
Australia. So the charity decided tosend me to the Philippines when I was
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fourteen years old, and there wasone night in the Philippines that changed my
life forever. On a slum inthe center of Manilla called Smoky Mountain.
It's the community that's built on topof a rubbish jump or the community revolves
around scavenging, so they run upto the garbage trucks when they come in
every single night to try to getbits of scrap nets or pieces of food
(10:28):
or things that they can recycle.And that night I was placed in the
care of a kid my own agenamed Sunny Boy, and we were both
fourteen at the time, but ourlives couldn't have been more different. And
when it came time to go tosleep that night, you know, I'll
never forget. We lay on aconcrete slab the size of part of my
bedroom with myself and Sunny Boy inhis whole family, seven of us in
(10:50):
this long line. And we laythere that night with the smell of rubbish
all around us and cockroaches crawling allover us. And I just knew that
it was pure chance that I wasborn where I was born, and he
was born into extreme poverty. Andso I decided that night I was going
to commit my life to this commission. And I came back and I said
(11:11):
to my mum, you know,I said, I'm inspired by what I've
seen, and I am inspired byMother Teresa. Would you let me go
to India to live there? Andshe she wasn't excited about that idea,
and she said, you know,there's no way I'm going to let you
go. But I made a dealwith my parents. I said, if
(11:31):
I can get a scholarship to studyin India, would you let me go?
And so I worked as hard asI could and got this academic scholarship,
and when I was fifteen years old, went off to live in the
Himalayan mountains of India at a schoolcalled Woodstock School in northern India, and
would volunteer with Mother Teresa's orphanage inin Deradoon in Uttarakhand. And so it
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became very personal for me at ayoung age. And when I graduated from
high school, I went to livefor a year and a half in Quazalinatal
in Southern Africa, and I spentmy whole time living at an orphanage for
about a hundred children orphaned by HIVAIDS and violence. And since then it's
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been my lifelong mission. And I'veseen again and again how charity and implementation
is important. But if you reallywant to achieve scale. You need to
convince governments, the private sector andphilanthropy to give at a clique that they're
currently not giving. That we're nevergoing to achieve the eradication of poverty,
(12:39):
which I believe is the greatest challengeof our generation, and it's certainly the
one challenge that everyone seems to agreeon, whether you're from the political left
or the political right. Everyone believesthat no child should be hungry. Everyone
believes that that everyone should have theopportunity for economic development. And so it's
certainly come my life's passion and themission of our organization, Global Citizen,
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and it is possible. And it'sinteresting we're having this conversation following a UN
report that just came out, whichI'm sure you're aware of, highlighting the
fact that four hundred and fifteen millionpeople were lifted out of poverty in India,
place that you just mentioned, overthe course of the past fifteen years.
(13:24):
Yeah, So it's really an interestingstory, the story of poverty alleviation.
When I was born in nineteen eightythree, fifty two percent of the
planet lived in extreme poverty. Wethen, by about two thousand and five,
two thousand and six that rate wasreduced to around twelve percent of the
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world's population, so enormous progress inour lifetime. Unfortunately, however, there
was a new report that came outjust a few days ago that I saw
Bloomberg report on and this is thetragedy of the current circumstances, the fact
that we now have gone through yearsof COVID, we've had economic recession,
and obviously the war in Ukraine,and it highlights that there's now as a
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result of these factors, one hundredand twenty two million more people have been
pushed into hunger since twenty nineteen.So the last three years have been devastating
for the movement to tackle hunger andto tackle acute malnutrition. And so what
we're focused on right now is weobviously need to invest into Africa because hunger
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is not inevitable. Africa alone hassufficient arable fertile land to be the world's
bread basket. And so as theworld's biggest economy, the US and Congress
must protect not flash critical funding forforeign aid in its twenty twenty four budget.
We know that Congress is debating thebudget right now and they're considering a
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foreign aid cut at exactly the rightmoment where we have mounting food insecurity and
multiple global crisis. We need theUS to stand strong in helping developing countries
respond to global challenges and honor theircommitment to protect foreign assistance in the twenty
twenty four budget. And that's oneof the big things we're calling on as
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part of this year's Global Citizen Festivalcampaign. We need citizens to rise up
now and say, you know whatI stand against hunger. I believe that
you know where you are born shouldn'tdetermine whether you live or whether you die,
as Bono said so famously, andthis is something that we all need
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to stand for right now. I'mRyan Gorman, joined by Hugh Evans,
co founder and CEO of Global Citizen. You can learn more at global citizen
dot org. How do you choosethe organizations you work with to help distribute
the funds to get that help towhere it's needed around the world. So
(16:02):
it's a great question. So Ithink that what we often find, Ryan,
is that you have to work withimplementing partners that have scale. Let
me give you an example. Rightnow, we're campaigning on girls education globally,
but specifically we're also looking at educationfor children who've had their education disrupted
by either famine or natural disaster,or a factor beyond their control that's made
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them a refugee. And there's onlya few partners that are capable of reaching
into the most vulnerable situations. Oneof those partners is Education Cannot Wait.
They're a part of unitstaff and theyhave the ability and I've seen it firsthand.
I've been on the border of Peruand I've seen the Venezuelan refugees cross
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over the border and need access toeducation, and Education Cannot Wait has literally
had portable education sent to set upto those kids don't miss out on a
year of quality education, because ifthey do, then they're never going to
get back to school. And sowe work with the partners that have the
ability to have scale, that havethe ability to receive billions of dollars in
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funding, because not every organization isset up to receive that amount of funding,
but the ones they're focused on thisyear, if A focused on agricultural
development. As I've mentioned earlier aroundhunger relief. If AD is one of
the few organizations set up to beable to support smallhold agricultural farmers with the
ability to have fertilizers, seeds,and support to grow the crops they need
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to make Africa the bread basket thatit can be. Education cannot wait.
That I mentioned. We do aton of due diligence on all of the
organizations that we support, and wehave an entire policy and research team whose
entire job it is to monitor andevaluate every commitment that's made by a government
or a world leader, or abusiness leader or a philanthropist on the global
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citizen stage to make sure that theytrack that commitment so that the money ends
up with those who need it most. And we have a really, really
great success rate over over ninety sevenpercent of all the commitments that have been
made on the global citizen stage whohave been followed through in time and accurately,
because we hold world leaders feet tothe fire to make sure they actually
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follow through on it, so wedon't just let them use the global citizen
stage as a huge platform. Wethen hold them accountable to make sure that
they actually deliver on that promise.Let me expand out beyond the issue of
poverty for a moment, because whilethat's a core mission for global citizen your
organization also does other crucial work,from working to stop child marriage in Tanzania
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to partnering with Rihanna to call forthe education of millions of girls around the
world. Can you spend a momentrunning through some of the other significant challenges
Global Citizen is taking on. Yeah. Absolutely so. The Rihanna example is
a good one because you know,prior to Rihanna getting involved, there really
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hadn't been a major financing summit focusedon education around the world. But Rihanna
and her manager, Jay Brown andI met with President mccron and he agreed
together with the President of Senegal tohost the first see first ever major education
financing summit, and Rihanna's advocacy wascritical. She literally managed to convince the
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French government to double their investment intoglobal education that was two hundred million euros
at the time the contribution was given. It was absolutely phenomenal and in total
they raised billions of dollars through thatone summit that was held in Senegal.
It's a great example of how artistsusing their platforms very thoughtfully can create enormous
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change. Another great example is rightnow, we've been focused most recently on
the climate crisis we had. Wehad Billie Eilish, We had her,
we had John Baptiste, we hadLenny Kravitz join us in Paris because just
a few weeks ago, President mccronhosted the Global Financing Summit to try to
(20:11):
reform global financing, and our coholto action was calling on the World Bank
because for too long, the WorldBank hadn't been lending enough money to the
world's poorest nations to help them transitionto clean energy and withstand natural disasters.
So we called on the World Bankto change their policy and issue what are
(20:36):
called debt pause clauses. This soundsvery technical, but let me make it
super simple. It's basically saying thatif a country is struck by a natural
disaster, they shouldn't have to repaythat debt immediately to the World Bank.
They should invest that in actually supportingtheir own populations to rebuild and be able
to build infrastructure that is actually moreclimate resilient. And amazingly we got the
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commitment on stage. Just a fewweeks ago, we had the new President
of the World Bank. He's onlybeen in the job for the last three
weeks, and his first ever publicengagement was on the Global Citizen stage.
Committee, not just for the WorldBank, but for the many multilateral development
banks like the Asian Development Banking intoAmerican Development Bank, all committed to introduce
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these debt pause clauses for the mostvulnerable countries. This will save billions of
dollars that is usually spent in repayinginterest rates actually is now will be able
to be spent on supporting communities ifthey are struck by a natural disaster lack
a hurricane. And I'm going totell you the cool thing about this is
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that it's important to realize that thisdoesn't just affect people overseas. This affects
people all across America right now,because as we all know, America has
also been struck by hurricanes, andas we saw in Florida. You know,
many insurance companies are now saying thatthey're not even willing to ensure in
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Florida because of natural disasters. Soit's actually all of our interests to adopt
policies that help the most vulnerable people. This isn't just about those people over
there that happen to not be Americans. This is about all of us.
We all are affected by by thereality of increasing natural disasters, and so
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it's in everyone's interests to take actionon this issue, and I think that's
at the heart of being a globalcitizen. It's recognizing that the issues that
previously we thought, you know,as the old saying goes, no man
is an island unto themselves. Youknow, these issues affect all of us.
Whether it's refugees, whether it's economicdownturn, whether it's the challenges of
climate change, whereas we saw inthe war in Ukraine, whether its seeds
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not leaving the port of a deathsare and ending up in Africa and creating
a global fruit security crisis. Theseissues are all connected. Right now,
I'm Ryan Gorman joined by Hugh Evans, co founder and CEO of Global Citizen.
You can learn more about this tremendousorganization at global citizen dot org.
Two more things I want to touchon, and they both focus on taking
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action. So before we get tothe upcoming festival, just whenever somebody is
ready to join this movement, howwould they go about doing that and what
would they be doing. So theway in which you join the Global Citizen
movement is you download the Global Citizenapp and you start taking action. What
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we try to do is make actiontaking really simple because often people say,
well, how do I make adifference in the world, And we want
to be the first place that peoplewho want to make a daily difference go
to make that difference. And thereason why, you know why you can
trust Global Citizens. We have ateam of researchers that think through, Okay,
if millions of citizens all take thisaction calling on this world leader,
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what change is possible? Like exampleI gave earlier with the World Bank.
So that's why every action you takeon Global Citizen has had a team of
thoughtful researchers behind the scenes working todesign that action. And all of your
actions earn you points and you canuse those points, yes, to come
to the Global Citizen Festival, butyou can also use that to earn rewards
(24:19):
to see your favorite artists all aroundthe world wherever you are on the planet.
So it actually incentivizes daily activism anddaily action taking because we really believe
in the power of everyone taking actiontogether and that's why we designed the platform
the way we did. And thistakes the participation of artists to work correct.
(24:41):
Yeah. Absolutely. For example,Chris Martin of Coldplay, he made
a commitment in twenty fifteen to helpus curate the Global Citizen Festival until twenty
thirty. He jokes with me regularlythat he's halfway through his commitments and so
he's going to a way to go. But you know, like it absolutely
(25:03):
requires on the commitment of artists.You know, we were honored when the
third year into the festival, jayZ decided to headline, and then he
also came to India with Coldplay,and then he came to South Africa with
Beyonce in twenty eighteen. You know, we're thrilled when artists support the movement
over a long period of time.And whether it's been artists like Ed Shearon
(25:26):
or Pearl Jam or Stevie Wonder orThe Weekend, we're thrilled the world's greatest
artists have a key moments when weneed them signed on to support highly targeted
campaigns to make a difference from themin the world. And then I was
reading and everyone can find this atglobal Citizen dot org. The five activists
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who were winners of the Global Citizentwenty twenty three prize, I mean,
the work that they did is justincredible. Absolutely every year we award Young
Action Takers, Young social entrepreneurs fromaround the world with the Global Citizen Prize,
and then what we do is wedon't just give them the prize on
(26:10):
a fantacy stage. We then workwith them over the next twelve months to
support their campaigns because we believe thatthese young entrepreneurs they need a platform and
they often want to work with usto design a specific campaign that can have
a scalable impact. And all ofthem are making such a big impact.
And we also partner with technology companyCisco to award one of those action takers
(26:36):
with a two hundred and fifty thousanddollars cash prize. It's called the Cisco
Youth Leadership Award, so that thatwinner can go on and actually scale their
project and scale their impact in theircommunity over the coming years as well.
And so we love working with thosegrassroots community leaders wherever they are in the
world to have the biggest impact.I'm Ryan Gorman, joined by Hugh Evans,
co founder and CEO of Global Citizen. Let's talk about the upcoming Global
(27:02):
Citizen Festival happening September twenty third inNew York City's Central Park. What can
we expect and of course I'm surea lot of people listening right now they'd
love to be part of it.How can they do that? Well,
We're so thrilled that the Red HotChili Peppers as Lauren Hill as well as
Megan the Stallion, Conan Gray andStray Kids, have all agreed to perform
(27:25):
for free at the Global Citizen Festivalon September twenty third this year. I'm
so excited to have the Red HotChili Peppers headline the festival because for many
decades, I think they've occupied thatcreative space where action taking and music meet.
In fact, the first song Iever learned to play on the guitar
was under the Bridge by Red HotChili Peppers. Signs on a personal level
(27:48):
that they're going to be part ofit. They're going to do a really
long set on September twenty third,and if you want to earn free tickets
to come to Global Citizen. Wewant to encourage people all across America to
be part of this, so youcan download the Global Citizen app today.
Start taking action on issues of hunger, on issues of gender equality, on
(28:11):
issues of as we've talked about earlier, protecting the planet, and all of
these actions. Earn your points andyou can enter the draw to win a
pair of free tickets at the festivalin Central Park this summer. It's going
to be an amazing event, asit is every year, and it's really
really important work that's being done allacross the world thanks to your organization.
(28:33):
Hugh Evans, co founder and CEOof Global Citizen Again, you can learn
more at Global citizen dot org.Q I want to thank you so much
for the time and like I said, for all the tremendous work that you
and your organization are doing. Thankyou, Ryan, and thank you to
everyone at our Heart for your partnership. Of course, thanks again, Hugh,
(28:53):
and I got to say after navigatingthe website and downloading the app,
it couldn't be easier to start totake action with Global Citizens or again global
citizen dot org and you can alsodownload the app, and that's going to
do it for this edition of iHeartRadioCommunities. As we wrap things up,
(29:14):
I want to offer big thanks,of course to Hugh Evans for coming on
the show and to all of youfor listening. If you want to hear
previous episodes of this show, we'reon your iHeartRadio app. Just search for
iHeartRadio communities. I'm your host,Ryan Gorman. We'll talk to you again
real soon.
Welcome to iHeartRadio Communities, a publicaffairs special focusing on the biggest issues impacting
you. This week, here's RyanGorman. Thanks so much for joining us
here on iHeartRadio Communities. I'm RyanGorman, and we have a really important
conversation lined up for you. Overseven hundred million people across the world live
(00:21):
in extreme poverty. Regions across Africa, Asia and Latin America are the ones
most impacted, and unfortunately, we'veseen an increase in global poverty for the
first time since nineteen ninety eight,following the COVID nineteen pandemic. Now,
if you're wondering what exactly global povertymeans, it's defined by the World Bank
as the share of the world's populationliving on less than a dollar and ninety
(00:45):
cents a day. One organization workingtirelessly to tackle this issue is Global Citizen,
and right now I'm joined by cofounder and CEO Hugh Evans. You
can learn more about all the vitalwork they do at global citizen dot org.
Hugh, thanks so much for takingthe time to come on the show,
and let's start with the backstory tohow your organization was first created.
(01:08):
Well, firstly, thank you Ryanfor having me on your show, and
it's great to connect with you.Global Citizen was born based on that belief
that Nelson Mandela said when he saidthat overcoming poverty is not to suggest here
of charity, but it's an actof justice. He said, like slavery
and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It's man made and can be overcome
(01:30):
and eradicated by the actions of humanbeings. And really it all started in
twenty two thousand and six when theG twenty World leaders were coming through Melbourne,
where I'm from in Australia, andme and my mate Dan had this
idea to run this small concert becausewe were trying to convince the Australian government
(01:53):
and the G twenty leaders to increasetheir investment to combat hunger all around the
world. All my life, ifI've been passionate about the eradication of poverty
from living in the Philippines, inIndia and South Africa when I was a
kid, and we saw this opportunitywith the G twenty in town to try
to make a difference, and sowe hosted this small concert and one day
(02:15):
it all of a sudden blew upwhen we got a phone call from Bono
from YouTube, and Bono said,in his thick Irish accent, he said,
hey boys, I'm coming to Melbourne. I want to perform at your
Make Poverty History concert. And atthe time we thought it was a prank
call. We didn't believe it thatI know, but sure enough he was
(02:36):
serious and he asked Pearl Jam toperform with him, and they created,
obviously an amalgamation of you two andPearl Jam. They called it Ujam and
they came on stage first on ourbill and sang Rocking in the Free World
by Nearly Young and it went viralin the days before viral was a thing,
and we ended up standing on amillion Australians behind our Make Poverty History
(03:00):
campaign, and we convinced the governmentthe following year to double foreign aid,
so we raised six point two billiondollars in new funding for the world's poor.
And off the back of that,we got a phone call from the
United Nations here in New York andthey said, you know, we've seen
what you've done in Australia. Couldyou build this youth movement all around the
(03:21):
world. And me and my friendSimon, we went to watch an Inconvenient
Truth by Al Gore, and wesaid, wasn't it great how our Gore,
you know, talk so simply aboutthe challenges of climate change. You
know, could we do something similaron global poverty? And so we started
with this small presentation with the flag. So we used to take around to
(03:43):
college campuses. And then we hadthis dream a senior if we could pull
off a concert on the Great Lawnof Central Park in New York City.
But there was this big problem becausewhen we when we were in New York,
everyone's like, no, no,no, you can't do it on
the Great Lawn. You know,no one's done it on the Great Lawn
on a week since Simon and GarthUncle back in nineteen eighty three. It's
not going to happen. And sowe just kept getting no, no,
(04:05):
no, no no. So oneday we managed to get a meeting with
Mary Bloomberg's team and they're like,yeah, you can do it, but
you have to come up with aninnovative way to give away all the tickets
for free, and you have toget the world's biggest artists. And I
remember we went over to meet withthe Foo Fighters and they were the first
(04:26):
to sign on and their manager,John Silva, but were This is how
we were such a startup in thosedays. We were working out of a
broom closet type office and Lafayette Streetin New York with literally a couple of
volunteers and nothing else. And wewere a month out from the festival and
we hadn't raised all the money,and we had no headliner because the Foo
fighters said that sixty thousand people theywanted to have another big headliner. And
(04:50):
this is why I do believe thatsometimes miracles can happen, because I'll never
forget the day when we were inla and some in the Redstone, you
know, for the late head ofViacom. He called us and said,
come come to my house, andhe literally wrote a check on the spot
for over a million dollars to helpus make it happen. And then half
(05:12):
an hour later, Nearly Young calledus from Hawaii saying he wanted to headline
the first year. And I waslike wow. And so we were already
in August and our festival takes placesand know every September, and amazingly,
you know, a month later,sixty thousand people came and were able to
secure commitment commitments of over a billiondollars to support our mission of eradicating poverty.
(05:35):
And the cool thing about Global Citizenis that none of that money that's
announced on stage goes to us.We give it directly to all the charities
that we support. And we thoughtthat year one was going to be the
end of it because we were sotired at the end of pulling it off.
But the day after we got acall from Stevie Wonder and his agent
Rob Liked, and Stevie's like,you know, boys, I saw what
(05:57):
you did. I want to headlineYear two and you said, with all
respectness to Wander, there is noYear two as well, there is now
and so that's that's why Global Citizengrew to now become the largest movement of
its kind around the world. Youknow, we now have millions of members
all around the world. The festivalhas gone to South Africa with Beyonce and
(06:19):
Jay Z for Mandela's one hundredth anniversary, which we've been to Germany. We've
been most recently in Paris with obviouslytwo years ago with Ed Shearon and with
Elton Johnaman this year with Billie Eilishand Lenny Kravitz and her. So we're
thrilled that the movement has now becometruly global and as as inspiring young people
(06:43):
all around the world. But we'vealways stayed true to that idea that you
have to earn your way into thefestival. You can't buy tickets to Global
Citizen. It's eighty percent of thetickets are given away for free in exchange
for your actions, and you usethe Global Citizen an apt to take action
because we believe, as Mandela said, that our collective voice is so much
(07:05):
more powerful than just our individual voice, and so we use the power of
that collective voice to convince world leadersto make multi billion dollar pledges because you
and I know that extreme poverty isa three point five trillion dollars challenge.
You know it's not going to besold through a bunch of black tie gala
dinners. That's never going to makethe difference. We need. Such an
(07:28):
incredible story. I have to goback though to the very beginning, when
when you're just starting with this concertin Australia, How did Barno get wind
of it? Well, it wasactually in the day when my space was
still and I remember, I rememberthat I remember still the lady from my
Space. And then with Rebecca Horn, we met with her in Sydney and
(07:50):
she agreed to put global it wascalled Make Poverty History back in those days.
She agreed to put the Make PovertyHistory confort on the front page of
my Space and so everyone everyone like, our numbers of sign ups were huge,
and so Bono heard about it becauseobviously he was, you know,
touring with you two around that time, and you know, his manager Paul
(08:13):
McGinnis at that stage reached out andwas like and was like, yeah,
Bonno wants to do this, andwe're like, wow. We just didn't
believe it because I was I rememberI was in the law library. I
was studying law at the time,and I was like, now, this
isn't real. We all thought itwas a prank call. But sure enough,
you know, Bono really has been, as you know that the godfather
(08:35):
of this movement. And you know, he and I have worked together,
most recently on our Stand Up forUkraine campaign last year after Russia's unjust invasion
of Ukraine. Bono was the firstto call and we mobilized the international community
to come together to raise over sixbillion dollars to support refugees fleeing the war
(08:58):
in Ukraine. So his coman throughhis own one campaign and everything he's done
with Red is enduring, and sowe're happy to be in a bigger alliance
to change the world. I'm RyanGorman, joined by Hugh Evans, co
founder and CEO of Global Citizen.You can learn more all about their very
(09:18):
important work at global citizen dot org. This mission it's very personal to you.
You can tell as you talk aboutthe work you're doing. Do you
mind sharing with us a bit aboutyour personal experience with poverty? Yeah.
So I grew up in just middleclass Melbourne in Australia, and there was
(09:43):
an experience that changed my life.When I was fourteen years old. I'd
started raising money for an organization inAustralia and their work to alleviate poverty around
the world. And I was avery eager young kid, so I raised
as much money as I could andevent I became the highest fundraising kid in
Australia. So the charity decided tosend me to the Philippines when I was
(10:05):
fourteen years old, and there wasone night in the Philippines that changed my
life forever. On a slum inthe center of Manilla called Smoky Mountain.
It's the community that's built on topof a rubbish jump or the community revolves
around scavenging, so they run upto the garbage trucks when they come in
every single night to try to getbits of scrap nets or pieces of food
(10:28):
or things that they can recycle.And that night I was placed in the
care of a kid my own agenamed Sunny Boy, and we were both
fourteen at the time, but ourlives couldn't have been more different. And
when it came time to go tosleep that night, you know, I'll
never forget. We lay on aconcrete slab the size of part of my
bedroom with myself and Sunny Boy inhis whole family, seven of us in
(10:50):
this long line. And we laythere that night with the smell of rubbish
all around us and cockroaches crawling allover us. And I just knew that
it was pure chance that I wasborn where I was born, and he
was born into extreme poverty. Andso I decided that night I was going
to commit my life to this commission. And I came back and I said
(11:11):
to my mum, you know,I said, I'm inspired by what I've
seen, and I am inspired byMother Teresa. Would you let me go
to India to live there? Andshe she wasn't excited about that idea,
and she said, you know,there's no way I'm going to let you
go. But I made a dealwith my parents. I said, if
(11:31):
I can get a scholarship to studyin India, would you let me go?
And so I worked as hard asI could and got this academic scholarship,
and when I was fifteen years old, went off to live in the
Himalayan mountains of India at a schoolcalled Woodstock School in northern India, and
would volunteer with Mother Teresa's orphanage inin Deradoon in Uttarakhand. And so it
(11:54):
became very personal for me at ayoung age. And when I graduated from
high school, I went to livefor a year and a half in Quazalinatal
in Southern Africa, and I spentmy whole time living at an orphanage for
about a hundred children orphaned by HIVAIDS and violence. And since then it's
(12:16):
been my lifelong mission. And I'veseen again and again how charity and implementation
is important. But if you reallywant to achieve scale. You need to
convince governments, the private sector andphilanthropy to give at a clique that they're
currently not giving. That we're nevergoing to achieve the eradication of poverty,
(12:39):
which I believe is the greatest challengeof our generation, and it's certainly the
one challenge that everyone seems to agreeon, whether you're from the political left
or the political right. Everyone believesthat no child should be hungry. Everyone
believes that that everyone should have theopportunity for economic development. And so it's
certainly come my life's passion and themission of our organization, Global Citizen,
(13:03):
and it is possible. And it'sinteresting we're having this conversation following a UN
report that just came out, whichI'm sure you're aware of, highlighting the
fact that four hundred and fifteen millionpeople were lifted out of poverty in India,
place that you just mentioned, overthe course of the past fifteen years.
(13:24):
Yeah, So it's really an interestingstory, the story of poverty alleviation.
When I was born in nineteen eightythree, fifty two percent of the
planet lived in extreme poverty. Wethen, by about two thousand and five,
two thousand and six that rate wasreduced to around twelve percent of the
(13:45):
world's population, so enormous progress inour lifetime. Unfortunately, however, there
was a new report that came outjust a few days ago that I saw
Bloomberg report on and this is thetragedy of the current circumstances, the fact
that we now have gone through yearsof COVID, we've had economic recession,
and obviously the war in Ukraine,and it highlights that there's now as a
(14:11):
result of these factors, one hundredand twenty two million more people have been
pushed into hunger since twenty nineteen.So the last three years have been devastating
for the movement to tackle hunger andto tackle acute malnutrition. And so what
we're focused on right now is weobviously need to invest into Africa because hunger
(14:35):
is not inevitable. Africa alone hassufficient arable fertile land to be the world's
bread basket. And so as theworld's biggest economy, the US and Congress
must protect not flash critical funding forforeign aid in its twenty twenty four budget.
We know that Congress is debating thebudget right now and they're considering a
(14:56):
foreign aid cut at exactly the rightmoment where we have mounting food insecurity and
multiple global crisis. We need theUS to stand strong in helping developing countries
respond to global challenges and honor theircommitment to protect foreign assistance in the twenty
twenty four budget. And that's oneof the big things we're calling on as
(15:18):
part of this year's Global Citizen Festivalcampaign. We need citizens to rise up
now and say, you know whatI stand against hunger. I believe that
you know where you are born shouldn'tdetermine whether you live or whether you die,
as Bono said so famously, andthis is something that we all need
(15:39):
to stand for right now. I'mRyan Gorman, joined by Hugh Evans,
co founder and CEO of Global Citizen. You can learn more at global citizen
dot org. How do you choosethe organizations you work with to help distribute
the funds to get that help towhere it's needed around the world. So
(16:02):
it's a great question. So Ithink that what we often find, Ryan,
is that you have to work withimplementing partners that have scale. Let
me give you an example. Rightnow, we're campaigning on girls education globally,
but specifically we're also looking at educationfor children who've had their education disrupted
by either famine or natural disaster,or a factor beyond their control that's made
(16:26):
them a refugee. And there's onlya few partners that are capable of reaching
into the most vulnerable situations. Oneof those partners is Education Cannot Wait.
They're a part of unitstaff and theyhave the ability and I've seen it firsthand.
I've been on the border of Peruand I've seen the Venezuelan refugees cross
(16:47):
over the border and need access toeducation, and Education Cannot Wait has literally
had portable education sent to set upto those kids don't miss out on a
year of quality education, because ifthey do, then they're never going to
get back to school. And sowe work with the partners that have the
ability to have scale, that havethe ability to receive billions of dollars in
(17:08):
funding, because not every organization isset up to receive that amount of funding,
but the ones they're focused on thisyear, if A focused on agricultural
development. As I've mentioned earlier aroundhunger relief. If AD is one of
the few organizations set up to beable to support smallhold agricultural farmers with the
ability to have fertilizers, seeds,and support to grow the crops they need
(17:32):
to make Africa the bread basket thatit can be. Education cannot wait.
That I mentioned. We do aton of due diligence on all of the
organizations that we support, and wehave an entire policy and research team whose
entire job it is to monitor andevaluate every commitment that's made by a government
or a world leader, or abusiness leader or a philanthropist on the global
(17:56):
citizen stage to make sure that theytrack that commitment so that the money ends
up with those who need it most. And we have a really, really
great success rate over over ninety sevenpercent of all the commitments that have been
made on the global citizen stage whohave been followed through in time and accurately,
because we hold world leaders feet tothe fire to make sure they actually
(18:18):
follow through on it, so wedon't just let them use the global citizen
stage as a huge platform. Wethen hold them accountable to make sure that
they actually deliver on that promise.Let me expand out beyond the issue of
poverty for a moment, because whilethat's a core mission for global citizen your
organization also does other crucial work,from working to stop child marriage in Tanzania
(18:41):
to partnering with Rihanna to call forthe education of millions of girls around the
world. Can you spend a momentrunning through some of the other significant challenges
Global Citizen is taking on. Yeah. Absolutely so. The Rihanna example is
a good one because you know,prior to Rihanna getting involved, there really
(19:03):
hadn't been a major financing summit focusedon education around the world. But Rihanna
and her manager, Jay Brown andI met with President mccron and he agreed
together with the President of Senegal tohost the first see first ever major education
financing summit, and Rihanna's advocacy wascritical. She literally managed to convince the
(19:26):
French government to double their investment intoglobal education that was two hundred million euros
at the time the contribution was given. It was absolutely phenomenal and in total
they raised billions of dollars through thatone summit that was held in Senegal.
It's a great example of how artistsusing their platforms very thoughtfully can create enormous
(19:48):
change. Another great example is rightnow, we've been focused most recently on
the climate crisis we had. Wehad Billie Eilish, We had her,
we had John Baptiste, we hadLenny Kravitz join us in Paris because just
a few weeks ago, President mccronhosted the Global Financing Summit to try to
(20:11):
reform global financing, and our coholto action was calling on the World Bank
because for too long, the WorldBank hadn't been lending enough money to the
world's poorest nations to help them transitionto clean energy and withstand natural disasters.
So we called on the World Bankto change their policy and issue what are
(20:36):
called debt pause clauses. This soundsvery technical, but let me make it
super simple. It's basically saying thatif a country is struck by a natural
disaster, they shouldn't have to repaythat debt immediately to the World Bank.
They should invest that in actually supportingtheir own populations to rebuild and be able
to build infrastructure that is actually moreclimate resilient. And amazingly we got the
(21:00):
commitment on stage. Just a fewweeks ago, we had the new President
of the World Bank. He's onlybeen in the job for the last three
weeks, and his first ever publicengagement was on the Global Citizen stage.
Committee, not just for the WorldBank, but for the many multilateral development
banks like the Asian Development Banking intoAmerican Development Bank, all committed to introduce
(21:21):
these debt pause clauses for the mostvulnerable countries. This will save billions of
dollars that is usually spent in repayinginterest rates actually is now will be able
to be spent on supporting communities ifthey are struck by a natural disaster lack
a hurricane. And I'm going totell you the cool thing about this is
(21:42):
that it's important to realize that thisdoesn't just affect people overseas. This affects
people all across America right now,because as we all know, America has
also been struck by hurricanes, andas we saw in Florida. You know,
many insurance companies are now saying thatthey're not even willing to ensure in
(22:03):
Florida because of natural disasters. Soit's actually all of our interests to adopt
policies that help the most vulnerable people. This isn't just about those people over
there that happen to not be Americans. This is about all of us.
We all are affected by by thereality of increasing natural disasters, and so
(22:23):
it's in everyone's interests to take actionon this issue, and I think that's
at the heart of being a globalcitizen. It's recognizing that the issues that
previously we thought, you know,as the old saying goes, no man
is an island unto themselves. Youknow, these issues affect all of us.
Whether it's refugees, whether it's economicdownturn, whether it's the challenges of
climate change, whereas we saw inthe war in Ukraine, whether its seeds
(22:47):
not leaving the port of a deathsare and ending up in Africa and creating
a global fruit security crisis. Theseissues are all connected. Right now,
I'm Ryan Gorman joined by Hugh Evans, co founder and CEO of Global Citizen.
You can learn more about this tremendousorganization at global citizen dot org.
Two more things I want to touchon, and they both focus on taking
(23:07):
action. So before we get tothe upcoming festival, just whenever somebody is
ready to join this movement, howwould they go about doing that and what
would they be doing. So theway in which you join the Global Citizen
movement is you download the Global Citizenapp and you start taking action. What
(23:32):
we try to do is make actiontaking really simple because often people say,
well, how do I make adifference in the world, And we want
to be the first place that peoplewho want to make a daily difference go
to make that difference. And thereason why, you know why you can
trust Global Citizens. We have ateam of researchers that think through, Okay,
if millions of citizens all take thisaction calling on this world leader,
(23:57):
what change is possible? Like exampleI gave earlier with the World Bank.
So that's why every action you takeon Global Citizen has had a team of
thoughtful researchers behind the scenes working todesign that action. And all of your
actions earn you points and you canuse those points, yes, to come
to the Global Citizen Festival, butyou can also use that to earn rewards
(24:19):
to see your favorite artists all aroundthe world wherever you are on the planet.
So it actually incentivizes daily activism anddaily action taking because we really believe
in the power of everyone taking actiontogether and that's why we designed the platform
the way we did. And thistakes the participation of artists to work correct.
(24:41):
Yeah. Absolutely. For example,Chris Martin of Coldplay, he made
a commitment in twenty fifteen to helpus curate the Global Citizen Festival until twenty
thirty. He jokes with me regularlythat he's halfway through his commitments and so
he's going to a way to go. But you know, like it absolutely
(25:03):
requires on the commitment of artists.You know, we were honored when the
third year into the festival, jayZ decided to headline, and then he
also came to India with Coldplay,and then he came to South Africa with
Beyonce in twenty eighteen. You know, we're thrilled when artists support the movement
over a long period of time.And whether it's been artists like Ed Shearon
(25:26):
or Pearl Jam or Stevie Wonder orThe Weekend, we're thrilled the world's greatest
artists have a key moments when weneed them signed on to support highly targeted
campaigns to make a difference from themin the world. And then I was
reading and everyone can find this atglobal Citizen dot org. The five activists
(25:47):
who were winners of the Global Citizentwenty twenty three prize, I mean,
the work that they did is justincredible. Absolutely every year we award Young
Action Takers, Young social entrepreneurs fromaround the world with the Global Citizen Prize,
and then what we do is wedon't just give them the prize on
(26:10):
a fantacy stage. We then workwith them over the next twelve months to
support their campaigns because we believe thatthese young entrepreneurs they need a platform and
they often want to work with usto design a specific campaign that can have
a scalable impact. And all ofthem are making such a big impact.
And we also partner with technology companyCisco to award one of those action takers
(26:36):
with a two hundred and fifty thousanddollars cash prize. It's called the Cisco
Youth Leadership Award, so that thatwinner can go on and actually scale their
project and scale their impact in theircommunity over the coming years as well.
And so we love working with thosegrassroots community leaders wherever they are in the
world to have the biggest impact.I'm Ryan Gorman, joined by Hugh Evans,
co founder and CEO of Global Citizen. Let's talk about the upcoming Global
(27:02):
Citizen Festival happening September twenty third inNew York City's Central Park. What can
we expect and of course I'm surea lot of people listening right now they'd
love to be part of it.How can they do that? Well,
We're so thrilled that the Red HotChili Peppers as Lauren Hill as well as
Megan the Stallion, Conan Gray andStray Kids, have all agreed to perform
(27:25):
for free at the Global Citizen Festivalon September twenty third this year. I'm
so excited to have the Red HotChili Peppers headline the festival because for many
decades, I think they've occupied thatcreative space where action taking and music meet.
In fact, the first song Iever learned to play on the guitar
was under the Bridge by Red HotChili Peppers. Signs on a personal level
(27:48):
that they're going to be part ofit. They're going to do a really
long set on September twenty third,and if you want to earn free tickets
to come to Global Citizen. Wewant to encourage people all across America to
be part of this, so youcan download the Global Citizen app today.
Start taking action on issues of hunger, on issues of gender equality, on
(28:11):
issues of as we've talked about earlier, protecting the planet, and all of
these actions. Earn your points andyou can enter the draw to win a
pair of free tickets at the festivalin Central Park this summer. It's going
to be an amazing event, asit is every year, and it's really
really important work that's being done allacross the world thanks to your organization.
(28:33):
Hugh Evans, co founder and CEOof Global Citizen Again, you can learn
more at Global citizen dot org.Q I want to thank you so much
for the time and like I said, for all the tremendous work that you
and your organization are doing. Thankyou, Ryan, and thank you to
everyone at our Heart for your partnership. Of course, thanks again, Hugh,
(28:53):
and I got to say after navigatingthe website and downloading the app,
it couldn't be easier to start totake action with Global Citizens or again global
citizen dot org and you can alsodownload the app, and that's going to
do it for this edition of iHeartRadioCommunities. As we wrap things up,
(29:14):
I want to offer big thanks,of course to Hugh Evans for coming on
the show and to all of youfor listening. If you want to hear
previous episodes of this show, we'reon your iHeartRadio app. Just search for
iHeartRadio communities. I'm your host,Ryan Gorman. We'll talk to you again
real soon.
Host
Manny Munoz
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