Chuffed.org Team – Page 22 – The Chuffed Academy

July 17, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Simon’s Beard for Good

“I’m very passionate about sustainability, by this I mean encompassing a triple-bottom-line approach to life considering the economic, social and environmental aspects of how I live my life. This is my main value and so I try wherever to minimise my impact on the planet and where possible to improve it environmentally and socially.

Beard for good was born from me deciding not to shave or cut my hair whilst I was away travelling last year. It was then that I then realised, as a former Movember participant, I could use this growth for good. Having witnessed a lot of stray animals and homelessness in South America, mainly Bolivia and Colombia, I decided I would donate money to these causes in Melbourne. Whilst I could have donated money to programs in these countries, there are issues with homelessness and stray animals on our own doorstep. After garnering some advice from colleagues, I decided to raise money for Pets Haven and Latitude.

Pets Haven – Pets Haven is not your normal every day animal shelter. We are a Pro-Life facility, we do not believe in euthanising healthy animals for economic reasons or to simply make room. Our emphasis relates to helping both human beings and our orphaned animals. We strongly believe in respecting both humans and animals. Our aim is to responsibly rehouse companion pets back into our community, where they belong.

Latitude – Latitude provides support to over 200 young people a year in Moonee Valley and Hobsons Bay, this does not include the additional 95 young people we assist to ‘purchase’ accommodation, this is providing access to crisis accommodation. Currently the list of young people actively seeking homelessness support is sitting around 139, this is only young people 16 -25yrs for the LGA’s of Moonee Valley, Maribyrnong, Hobsons Bay and Wyndham. Many young people will exist for a number of years couch surfing before making it to a homeless service.

Beard for good may be perceived as a very simple concept (or lazy fundraising) but it is an everyday reminder to me and hopefully those that support me, that homelessness and stray animals are still a part of our inner urban fabric.”

Check out Simon’s campaign below:

July 14, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: EDOWA, Western Australia’s Leading Advocate for the Environment

“For over 20 years, the Environmental Defender’s Office of Western Australia (EDOWA) has provided free or low cost legal services to communities across WA to defend the environment and promote environmental protection through law.

Our story began in 1995, with volunteers from the environmental movement and legal profession concerned by the lack of assistance and information available to people seeking to protect the environment. Some of our early work involved appearing in the WA Supreme Court to protect WA’s old growth forests.

EDOWA provides legal advice and representation, develops environmental law resources for the public, hosts community events, and provides input into law reform initiatives. We work diligently with limited resources and a small team, the support of our volunteers, and our generous donors and members. What brings us all together is our commitment to and hope for environmental change. Because if we didn’t do this work, no one else would!

In January this year, environmental lawyer Declan Doherty joined EDOWA as Principal Solicitor. Declan didn’t think twice about taking on the challenge of leading EDOWA. The organisation provides a unique opportunity to work with passionate people – office volunteers, law students, and clients from the broader community and conservation sector – to achieve real and lasting outcomes for our environment. Declan has been inspired by the many motivated law students who volunteer their time each week to assist him and solicitor Isaac St Clair-Burns deliver advices and presentations to clients and prepare for matters in court.

One of our most recent cases is an action in the Supreme Court of WA on behalf of a number of Tjiwarl Traditional Owners from the Central Desert, as well as the Conservation Council of WA, for a judicial review of the decision to approve the Yeelirrie Uranium Project.

We are also representing a number of conservation groups who are working to prevent mining in the stunning banded ironstone formations in the Helena Aurora Ranges (Bungalbin). Our clients say that this area of WA should be protected, and we agree! The WA Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) recently released a report recommending that mining of this area not occur and that the area be placed into an A Class Reserve. But the fight is not over yet! We are in court in early August.

Check out EDOWA’s crowdfunding campaign to protect the WA environment for many more years:

July 13, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Homeless Healthcare

“I started working for Homeless Healthcare almost 8 years ago initially as their bookkeeper but given my enthusiasm for the cause, my role has expanded to include communications, marketing and now fundraising! They are a charity dedicated to providing healthcare to the homeless and marginally housed people of Perth.

Over the years I have been inspired by the amazing medical staff and their patience and dedication to the cause plus their ability to remain positive when faced with realities that are at times quite grim.

Two and a half years ago Homeless Healthcare started their Street Health program with the assistance of start-up funds from Impact100. Street Health targets rough sleepers who are not engaged with any social or medical services in our community. They are found in the parks, public gardens, doorways and pavements of the CBD, and are among the most disenfranchised and marginalised people in our society.

Rough sleepers have the worst health outcomes in our state with an average life expectancy of only 45 years and are notoriously difficult to engage because of their high levels of traumatic life experience. So as you can imagine, our nurses are pretty special people, full of empathy and compassion.

Their initial focus is on engagement, gaining trust and encouraging rough sleepers to start using services such as drop in centres and Homeless Healthcare GP clinics. The nurses provide basic medical care on the streets like blood pressure and blood sugar checks, suturing of small lacerations and doing wound dressings.

One patient recently said “Without Homeless Healthcare and its Street Health nurses I think I would be dead by now”. They helped to stabilise her diabetes and connect her to mental health services. There are countless stories similar to this. Their work is valuable, often lifesaving and has prevented many costly Emergency Department admissions.

We receive some funding from the Health Department for other services we provide but to date have had no success getting Street Health included. As of the 1^st July 2017 our funding for the program ran out which is why we decided to crowdfund on Chuffed.org.

After only 2 weeks of crowdfunding on Chuffed we managed to raise almost $23,000 which illustrates the level of public support there is for the program and enables our nurses to continue to provide care for another few months. Meantime we are doing all we can to secure funding from another source.”

View the Homeless Healthcare campaign below:

July 13, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Join the Local Food Revolution by Growing Abundance

“I grew up with an immigrant father – his background is Italian and none of his family came to Australia with him. In Italy, food is central to culture. For an immigrant in Australia, food is a living link to the homeland, the family and that distant culture. Subsequently, food and its origins are an important part of my life. I grew up around food, we grew some and celebrated food regularly – much of it not common in Australia at that time. We would go to Italian Delis to procure the meats and vegetables of his homeland, we ate seasonally and preserved the gluts of the season as many traditional cultures do. My parents also owned hotels and made food a very special part of that.

As an adult, I studied permaculture, art and community development and worked as a cook. After having 3 children, food and health became central to my daily life. I wanted to provide my children healthy and sustainable food that would not ‘cost the earth’. I came to The Growing Abundance Project in 2011 with a passion for food and the issues that were intersecting with corporate food production. Food is transported many miles to get to our plates but we are disconnected from our land and especially our farmers, who are increasingly paid less than they need to survive. As I learnt more about our current food systems, I felt increasingly angry that consumers are generally unaware of the inequity in those systems.

The Growing Abundance Project was spearheaded by local people in Castlemaine, Victoria, but it was Lucy Young who really held the seed of intention and the vision for what it could be to build a viable local food system. Over the years we have had many committed and passionate people who have contributed so much to the project. I am currently the café manager of our latest social enterprise, The Local. A café aimed at raising awareness of food related issues as well as financially supporting our Harvest Project that ‘rescues’ backyard fruit that would otherwise go to waste and redistributes back to the entire community for free, through schools, the Salvation Army and Community Lunch. We run a number of food related programs, all aimed at connecting our community through food and raising the possibility that we can all have an impact on food systems.”

Check out their campaigns here:

July 13, 2017July 31, 2017

Success Story: Become a Friendship Sponsor by Host Nation

“My name is Anneke and earlier this year I founded HostNation because I believe in the power of friendship to transform lives. Befriending is not a new idea but it’s a simple one, and I want to deliver it in a new way. I want to use technology and the sort of software used by online dating sites to help deliver it to those, who I believe, need it the most – asylum seekers, refugees, undocumented migrants in our cities. People not defined so much by their immigration status, but by social isolation and loneliness they experience. People who feel marginalised and unwelcome and live on the fringes of our cities. Few ever meet British people informally – someone who treats them as an equal and a friend – few have ever been invited into a British home. Yet when they are it’s transformative.

I’ve witnessed this at first hand. I’ve been volunteering in the refugee sector for many years – as a befriender to unaccompanied minors I was matched with Abu 6 years ago and he’s still part of my family and calls me his UK Mum. I also run a holiday scheme for Freedom from Torture where 100 clients from across the UK are referred to our wonderful hosts families and benefit hugely from their hospitality and on-going friendship.

It seems to me that opportunities to meet socially are too few. Its really hard if you’re a migrant, new to this country to make an English friend. And its pretty hard too if you’re a citizen with goodwill towards migrants. Through City of Sanctuary and Citizens UK I’ve met so many wonderful people who want to help and connect but don’t know how. I want this to be easier because being a friend or a companion isn’t that hard. We’re social creatures and hardwired to listen, talk, share stories, laugh, drink tea and be hospitable.

HostNation is an online introductory web referral and registration process that can match-make 100s of people needing friendship with those offering it and introduce them to one another face to face in their local communities. We’ve had the idea and we’ve hit the ground running. With volunteers working pro bono we’ve launched the website, we’re registering and screening befrienders online and we’re building a robust volunteer database. We have over 125 befrienders in Greater London alone.

We believe this is too important to get wrong and are raising funds to pilot the scheme in London this year. With your help we could start connecting lonely refugees to friendly, welcoming residents within a month and start making a real difference to lives in our capital.”

Learn more about this great campaign here:

July 12, 2017July 31, 2017

Crowdfunding for Legal Action – Australia for Dolphins Case Study

Australia for Dolphins (AFD) is a not-for-profit dolphin protection organisation with just two full time staff members. Even though they’re a small team, they pack a powerful punch.

In 2015, they brought legal action against the world’s peak zoo body, resulting in more than 60 Japanese aquariums being forced to stop buying dolphins from the violent Taiji hunts. They also successfully sued the notorious Whale Museum in Taiji, the centre of the bloody dolphin hunts.

In 2017, they had their sights focused on an Australian marine park, who still held dolphins in captivity. The team decided that they were going to sue the park for false advertising – their ads that said dolphins were happy and healthy, they just aren’t true.

Here’s how they did it:

Tactic 1. To tackle a global issue, focus on one story

The global dolphin captivity industry is such a large scale global issue that it can be overwhelming and lacks an emotional hook.

Rather than focus on the industry issue, AFD focused their story on one particular dolphin at Dolphin Marine Magic.

“We realised that the best way to raise awareness about this complicated issue and drive the campaign forward was to give it a singular narrative. We focused the story on one particular dolphin, called Ji, to give people a better idea of what the bigger picture is about. The title, video, the name of the legal action were all focused on this one dolphin, Ji.”

Tactic 2. Get to new audiences by leveraging your existing ones

For AFD, whenever they run a crowdfunding campaign, they focus on using it to reach new audiences. How?

Two ways:

1. Ask their existing audiences (people who they know are passionate about the cause, including people who had previously signed petitions or signed up to their newsletter) to share their campaigns with their family, friends and networks

“We have a number of supporters that already donate to us on a regular basis, and others that have donated substantial amounts in the past. We don’t want to ask them for more funds and will often exclude them from our other fundraising asks and campaigns. We will, however, keep them updated on what we’re doing: send them an email to let them know we’ve launched a new campaign and to thank them for helping us get this far (we treat them as if they’ve already supported our campaign, because in all honesty, they’re the ones who’ve gotten us this far already!). We may still ask them to like and share our posts on Facebook, so they can help us reach more people.”

2. Run Paid Facebook Ads: Advertising petitions and crowdfunding campaigns on Facebook to selected targeted audiences. They focus on people who are interested in animal welfare or specific dolphin captivity issues.

Here’s an example of a Facebook Ad they promoted during the campaign:

This segmented approach to communications, making their core supporters feel valued and included while focusing on reaching new audiences, is a powerful strategy that has allowed AFD to grow their audience to a strong community of over 200,000 people passionate about dolphin welfare over the past few years.

“Before each campaign we benchmark our database numbers. When we advertise our petitions and advocacy campaigns – we don’t want people who’ve already signed to sign it again – so we exclude them from our email communications to make sure that all the people we are getting involved are new. With this particular campaign (which was a combination of petitions and the crowdfunding campaign), we got 20,000 new people on board, which was really great.“

Tactic 3. Get PR and media on board

The fact that AFD found an avenue of Consumer Law that allowed them to sue the marine park for misleading people to believe that their dolphins were happy and healthy was not only incredibly innovative, but also newsworthy. They knew the story had a good media hook and could get a lot of PR attention.

“A national TV show called The Project produced an exclusive segment explaining the pending legal action and the underlying issue of dolphin captivity. So, when we launched the legal action there was already interest surrounding the case.”

By having all the PR contacts and press releases lined up before launch, and letting journalists know beforehand, they were able to generate awareness during their campaign which they could then use to contact their supporters again and raise more funds.

For more tips on how to get PR on board, check out ‘5 steps to get PR for your Crowdfunding Campaign‘.

Tactic 4. Secure match funding as the ultimate incentive for giving

Perks and rewards are a great way of incentivising supporters to support your campaign or to give more than they usually would. However, because of the nature of their campaign, AFD decided that getting matched funding instead could be the ultimate reward for people to support their campaign:

“Prior to this campaign, we had run a Chuffed.org campaign to put up billboards in Tokyo to blast real images of the dolphin hunts. Each dollar raised during that campaign was matched by EthicalJobs.com.au. This time, however, the nature of what we were fundraising for was quite different and we felt we had to come up with more engaging content. We realised we had to come up with a good video and spent some time on that. But we also thought about prizes and rewards. Because matched funding had worked well in our previous campaign and the nature of the campaign, and the need to keep admin costs low prohibited us from creating fancy perks, we decided to look for match funding instead of prizes.”

This is how the match funding on their first campaign was communicated:

“We’re a really small charity, there’s only 2 full-time staff and although that has its challenges, it allows us to take a very personal approach to our donors. We’ll personally call everyone who gives more than $250 and will meet as many of them in person if we can. We’re in touch with them all the time and really build personal relationships with them. Almost like a community of people. Because we build a great relationship with donors, we find out what they’re passionate about (ie. Taiji or captivity issues). When something comes up that we think they might be interested in, we get in touch with them and see if they want to get involved. Keep them updated throughout – make them feel very involved.”

This is how they communicated the match donation to their supporters on the campaign page:

Small change, big impact

Although the crowdfunding campaign was focused on one particular marine park, the success of the case could have wide ramifications.

“This will send a very loud warning bell to big marine parks like SeaWorld. It will also set a precedent, which we hope will bolster global efforts to end dolphin captivity and help convince politicians this cruel practice has to end.” – Jordan Sosnowski

To learn more about AFD and their Crowdfunding campaigns on Chuffed.org, here are their campaigns:

https://chuffed.org/project/support-legal-action-to-expose-captive-dolphin-cruelty

https://chuffed.org/project/ethicaljobs-australia-for-dolphins-matched-donation

To support AFD’s legal action, sign their petition: https://enddolphincaptivity.afd.org.au/sign

If you are a charity, nonprofit, community group or a caring individual who wants to use crowdfunding to tackle a global issue or a local one, reach out to us at support@chuffed.org. We’re here to help.

July 11, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Amnesty 4 Manus & Nauru

“I’ve been a volunteer worker all my adult life, and after 20 years overseas working with indigenous communities and refugees in various countries, I returned home to Australia.

I moved to rural Tasmania, looking for a quieter life in my retirement. This didn’t last long, as I became increasingly concerned about how we were treating refugees. I vividly remember my shock at seeing people who came to us seeking asylum being forced onto buses and imprisoned in offshore detention camps. After many months of calling and writing to politicians, I received a friend request on Facebook. This was the first of the men imprisoned on Manus that I would talk to, and eventually come to call my friend. Over the next few years I would become a regular correspondent with many of the men and became witness to a heartbreaking series of physical, emotional and psychological abuses that became a daily part of life in the Manus camp. I helped in the only way I could – talking to them, listening to their fears, and eventually helping them organise medical and legal documents to be sent to organisations like Doctors for Refugees, the AMA and Amnesty.

Over the last three years I have got to know so many brave, resilient and amazing people. They have so much to offer to any country that provides them refuge: there are world-class sportsmen, engineers, poets, musicians, journalists, scientists, artists. There are those who have never known safety, who have been persecuted for their religion, or for speaking out against political injustice, corruption or censorship. There are people of many religions and those who have lost their faith. They are sons, brothers, fathers, and grandfathers. But for the accident of where we are born, these could be our sons, our brothers, our fathers.

If it wasn’t enough that the accident of being on the wrong boat, at the wrong time, has condemned these people to four years of hellish incarceration, there are some for whom even the slight hope of a U.S. settlement deal or relocation to some third country is not an option. Almost 170 of the men currently on Manus have not been granted refugee status, in many cases due to a flawed determination process. For these men, the imminent closure of the camp leaves literally no options. Some have already been forcibly deported back to danger. Others, like those who fled Iran cannot be returned, or are stateless Rohingya and cannot legally stay in PNG. The only hope for these men is to have their refugee status appealed, so they have at least the slight chance of eventually finding somewhere to settle.

The conditions on Manus are growing worse daily. Sections of the camp are being demolished around the men in an attempt to force them out, power keeps going out and there is not enough food.

Many of my friends have stopped talking to me, or only offer one-word responses.

Our government intends to abandon them. We cannot.

They have nowhere to go. They have no-one else to turn to.

If we don’t act, nobody will.”

Check out Anne & Helen’s inspiring campaign here:

As well as their completed campaigns below:

July 11, 2017July 25, 2017

How to Run a Campaign so Successful You Hit Two Stretch Goals

Do you wish you could share your passion with the world?

That’s exactly how Nat Panzarino and Fer Wicker felt. Both knew the struggles of greyhounds, and wanted to spread the message they lived out by volunteering for local greyhound rescue.

To do so, they decided to collaborate on a children’s book called Pointy Pembleton—written by Nat and illustrated by Fer—raising awareness about greyhounds in an appealing way. They’d also donate a portion of the book’s sales to greyhound rescue.

Their campaign required $15,000 to get the book to market, and it took off quickly. Once they noticed the success, Nat and Fer extended the goal to $20,000—then met it. They set a stretch goal of $25,000—and met it as well.

By the end of the campaign, they had raised $28,871 for the Pointy Pembleton campaign—almost twice as much as their original target.

But of course, the magic was behind the scenes.

Nat and Fer used three specific techniques to garner interest in the project and draw support.

Let’s jump in!

Tactic 1: Use videos to engage supporters

Throughout the entire campaign, Nat and Fer used videos to inform and rally supporters. The videos were vital to the campaign’s success, and really made it stand apart and develop relationships with readers.

To succeed with this medium, Nat and Fer followed a few principles.

They kept the videos positive and encouraging. Instead of including startling images of abused dogs, they chose to tell the story through uplifting stories of rescued greyhounds and Fer’s illustrations from the book. In the videos, they specifically asked people to share the project with friends to help the dogs.
They provided plenty of background information. To Nat and Fer’s surprise, they learned that many people didn’t know the background of abandoned greyhounds. The campaign explained everything in simple, concise language. “You don’t want to leave people with questions at the end,” Nat says, “so you want to try and answer all of their questions right there.”
They made the videos personal and informal. While the main promotional videos have a high production value, most of the videos Nat and Fer created for the campaign were casual, smartphone-filmed snippets of them and their dogs. Nat calls the videos she posted on Facebook groups “overly cheesy,” and some of the more popular video showed them working behind the scenes.

Tactic 2: Consistent communication

Nat and Fer were strategic with how they communicated to supporters, and it paid off big time.

Here’s how they succeeded.

They chose channels that already worked for them. Nat knew that Twitter wasn’t a strength for her and wasn’t as popular in Australia, so she focused just on Facebook and Instagram. A month before the launch, Nat and Fer created a Facebook page for Pointy Pembleton, and focused most of the promotion there.
They posted regularly. They posted a minimum of one time per day on Facebook and Instagram. But these weren’t all just requests for support—they gave behind-the-scenes detail and entertained followers with humorous and interesting videos.
They reached out to influencers. Every day, Nat spent about an hour messaging and posting to Facebook groups and pages to related organisations in the dog rescue and children’s book spaces. Only about one out of every 100 influencers responded, but those that did shared it themselves or encouraged her to promote to their followers.

You can check out all of their Facebook posts and videos here:

Tactic 3: Leverage your connections

One of the biggest factors leading to the success of the campaign was the large body of support Nat and Fer had before beginning.

Here are a few of the ways they rallied support with those who had already expressed interest before the campaign.

Enlisted volunteers to help. They already had 100 volunteer connections, and weren’t afraid to leverage them to join the cause. These volunteers helped spread the word and helped with some of the manual labor required to get the campaign going.
They used their follower’s content in their campaign. Nat created a guide for other to create their own videos for the campaign, and included those videos in the promotion. This built up a community and encouraged others to participate.
They encouraged existing followers to join the cause. Nat and Fer chose to not be shy about their request from support with their followers. After launching their Facebook page, they encouraged their existing 20,000 social media followers on the Greyhound Rescue page to like Pointy Pembleton. Nat also personally messaged her friends asking them to share the campaign.
They didn’t underestimate the funding of their existing supporters. Instead of expecting funding to come exclusively from others new to the campaign, Nat and Fer reached out to those who had closer ties to the campaign in the same way as those new to it—and it paid off! The biggest donor was an existing volunteer, and the second-biggest donor was Nat’s father-in-law.

Lessons learned…

Along the way, Nat and Fer also learned a number of strategies they weren’t expecting.

You don’t need experience to succeed at crowdfunding. Despite being brand-new to the crowdfunding space, Nat carefully studied the Chuffed.org campaign strategy videos. “I probably watched them like a half a dozen times,” Nat says.
Build as large a team as you can. Even with the sizeable number of volunteers helping them, Nat and Fer would have built an even bigger team in hindsight. Once the campaign started, they could have used even more volunteers to manage the huge volume of communications.
Promote to influencers early. Most of the bloggers and influencers Nat emailed didn’t get back to her for 2-3 weeks. “If I had to do it all over again,” Nat says, “I should have started attacking sooner and got them kind of on board before we wanted to launch.”

Nat and Fer learned a lot in the campaign process, and inspired countless others to their cause of helping rescue greyhounds.

With a strategic use of video, powerful communication, and an effective use of their connection, Nat and Fer led a project that surpassed all expectations.

Start your campaign on Chuffed.org today. We provide free mentoring and support for anyone looking to crowdfund a social cause project.

Pointy Pembleton is now available for pre-order. Head to their website for more information.

July 7, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Toward’s Wellbeing

“As an actor, after filming ‘The Tracker’, I was invited to some remote communities and was exposed to some of the extreme health problems that people are suffering from, as a direct result of having poor diet. This problem was magnified for me when I visited South Australia’s APY Lands to film ‘That Sugar Film’. People were suffering from type II diabetes and renal failure, from obesity and other diet-related diseases.

Here, on the APY Lands, was an entire population of Aboriginal Australians, directly affected by poor diets due to the introduction of sugar and processed foods – the APY lands have been alcohol free for 40 years.

Late last year I met Ina and her story gave me hope. Ina Scales grew up in the western community of Pipalyatjara on the APY Lands. Unlike most people from the area Ina’s family were able to ensure she got a good education which lead to work as an interpreter. Neither education, nor ongoing work are easily accessible in remote communities – for a range of reasons and challenges people face every day. Ina’s unique circumstances, and her ability to not only know that she needed some help, but was also able to seek it out, and then pay for it meant that she was able to get herself to Living Valley Springs.

In the two weeks Ina spent in the Living Valley Springs intensive workshops her world was turned around. She couldn’t believe the positive changes she felt within herself, and when she saw my film and made the connection to the challenges people are facing on the APY Lands through poor diet choices – she asked myself, and the Foundation for help. Ina could see that by giving people from her communities, an opportunity that they would not normally be able to access, to have two weeks of intense workshops in a supportive environment away from daily challenges, there was a chance that people’s poor health could be turned around. By giving people this opportunity, they too could return to community and shout the message of healthy eating and living from the roof tops, just as Ina has.

This same retreat has worked in the top end with Hope for Health – Yolngu returned with amazing results and a fresh attitude towards healthy living, and we are sure we can do the same for Anangu in Central Australia.

It’s a radical situation we are dealing with so it requires the radical approach that we are proposing. The costs are considerable in getting these women out to the retreat from such remote quarters, however their influence upon their return to community will be well worth it. We hope that we can have these sorts of retreats within community, once the word has spread as to how beneficial they are.”

Check out their campaign here:

July 7, 2017July 18, 2017

Success Story: Matt’s Walking to a Better World

Matt

“My name is Matt Napier and I want to see an end to world poverty.
During a trip to Nepal 11 years ago, I first realised how bad poverty can be in developing countries. I couldn’t face going back to my home in Australia and leaving these poor people behind when the only difference between us was the country we were born into. I had all the opportunities in the world but was wasting them, so decided to set my focus on becoming a voice for the world’s poor and since then have become an anti-poverty advocate.

Now, I’m no expert in International Development or a genius with a cure for the world’s ills, so what could I do? I decided to undertake extreme long distance adventures and use this to raise awareness of poverty, talk to schools and politicians and raise much needed funds for projects that I believe have the greatest chance of stopping the cycle of poverty.

So, in 2012 I cycled 3,800km across Australia and then in 2013 I bounced an Aussie Rules football from Perth to Sydney. These adventures were so successful that I then set my sights on Africa and in 2016 I walked 2,300km across southern Africa from Walvis Bay in Nambia to Maputo in Mozambique. I raised $62,000 through four separate chuffed campaigns (one for each of my charity partners) and also gave out over 200 soccer-balls to schools and community groups along the way. Oh yeah, did I mention I kicked a soccer-ball the whole way!?

This year I am walking 1,860km from the southern border of Namibia to the northern border with Angola. It will take me through some of the harshest terrain on earth including the Namibia Desert and the infamous Skeleton Coast. This year I have two charity partners – Empower Projects and Caritas Australia – and aim to fund a specific project through each of them. Each project is unique but the thing that they both have in common is that they work with the communities to identify their needs and solutions that will work for them, and then they support them to implement them in a way that is sustainable and will create long term change.

I am currently one week into my 7 week journey and although I am finding it a bit tough at the moment, I am encouraged by the support I have received and the emails I get from Chuffed telling me when someone has donated.”

Go Matt! Learn more about his mission by checking out his Chuffed.org campaigns: