Sunday, May 6, 2012

6. LIVE BELOW THE LINE CHALLENGE

A lonely quid sits on my dresser as I write this, and its difficult to imagine that a single coin could provide me with a days worth of nutrition. In 2009 Rich Fleming and Nick Allardice challenged the world with this idea by creating 'Live Below the Line,' an initiative of the Global Poverty Project.  This year, their global awareness week lasts from May 7 - 11, and we've decided to take on their  challenge.
 For the next 5 days we'll be working as a team (3 of us) with a combined budget of £15 to supply us with all of our food and drink. Globally, 1.4 billion people live in abject poverty on a budget of £1 a day, to cover things like food/drink, transportation, heating, electricity, schooling etc, and LBTL aims to communicate the realities of poverty through direct engagement. If you'd like to learn more, join us in the challenge, or donate to the cause, see the detailed rules or LBTL's official website
Being students, we are no strangers to penny-pinching and bargain shopping. After reading about what others who have done the challenge went through, we heeded their advice, compared prices across grocery stores, crunched a few numbers, and did a collective shop at Tesco's. We did our best not to compromise calories, nutrition, or taste, as we all lead busy lifestyles that require us to be well-fuelled, and below you can see the majority our bounty for the next five days. (Rice and potatoes not pictured! We've spent £9.27 thus far and are saving the remainder for fresh fruit and veg and potential unforeseen cravings throughout the week.)
We hope you'll join us in this challenge starting this Monday, May 7 and we would love to hear about your experiences. We'll be sharing ours, as well as our recipes, throughout the week.

4 comments:

  1. Made ham & bean soup with cornbread. It was good...and cheap. AKCDR

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  2. Oh gosh, I was going to take up this challenge, but decided against it because it's right in the middle of my exam period and I was worried my energy levels would suffer - looks like you're doing pretty well, so far, though! xx

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  3. This is such a a great challenge. I love this idea. I am interested in what you made and how the week went!

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