Hugh Jackman wants you to ‘Live Below the Line’ -- on $1.50 a day

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Can you live for a day on a $1.50 food budget? What about doing it for five days? That’s what Hugh Jackman is challenging people to do in a PSA for the Global Poverty Project’s ‘Live Below the Line’ campaign.

The Aussie triple-threat sits on the board of the Global Poverty Project, an international organization designed to target public policy to end extreme poverty, and appeared in the video for the ‘Live Below the Line’ campaign. Jackman urged Americans to live below the extreme poverty line by going a workweek spending less than a buck fifty each day on food from May 16 through May 20.

‘This is an incredible campaign that really gives us the chance to understand the realities of extreme poverty,’ Jackman said in a statement.

‘It is certainly a challenge to eat and drink off of $1.50 a day for five days, but for 1.4 billion people, $7.50 is all they have not only for food, but also for living costs, clothing -- everything! ‘Live Below the Line’ highlights the challenges that over 1 billion people are faced with every day and urges us to do something about it.’

The campaign was launched April 18 in London, but Jackman joined up with the Global Poverty Project about three years ago when he met founder Hugh Evans.

‘I thought, this guy is a lot smarter than me, he’s got better ideas, so I’m jumping on board,’ the ‘X-Men’ actor said. ‘This is a simple way to get people’s attention and more importantly get them to sympathize with the situation of the world.

‘Even though the issue of global poverty seems big, there are really simple, practical measures and ways to change things. Write a letter to your [Congress representative], write a letter to a company like Hershey’s, for example, to use fair trade chocolate or fair trade coffee. There’s simple things and that kind of activation means a lot.’

Will you take on Jackman’s challenge? Watch the PSA below and tell us in comments.

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-- Nardine Saad
twitter.com/NardineSaad