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"Text messaging is giving Africans the opportunity to make their voices heard by world leaders in a new campaign that kicked off Wednesday.\nPoverty fighting organization One launched its \"You Choose\" pilot program in South Africa, Malawi and Zambia, hoping to give Africans from those countries a voice at the U.N. when post-2015 development goals are considered in March. \nThe Millenium Development Goals, created to help lift the world's poorest from extreme poverty, were established in 2000 and are set to expire in 2015. As U.N. leaders gather to create a new set of goals, One hopes it can bring the priorities of the world's poorest to the negotiation tables.\n\"In 2000, the Millennium Development Goals were set out, which have been an incredibly powerful force for good in the world,\" One's chief marketing officer, Jeff Davidoff, told Mashable. \"There was one flaw, though: They didn't include the voice of the people they intended to help. If you really want to know what to do for the poorest people on the planet, there's a technology that unites all of the people in the world. That happens to be 2G technology.\"\nSEE ALSO: 5 Reasons Mobile Is the Future of Sustainable Development\n\nUnlike when the Millenium Development Goals were crafted, mobile phones now provide rapid mass communication for many living in Africa. There were just 16 million mobile phones on the continent in 2000, and now there are more than 650 million. \n\"In mobile phones you have a pretty efficient way to create a two-way dialogue and give these people a voice for the future,\" Davidoff says. \"You've got to use the right technology. If we stuck to just email or Facebook we'd be skipping over millions of people who need to be part of this.\"\nTo initially reach citizens, One is running radio ads featuring prominent musicians including Hugh Masekela, Lira, Jabulani Tsambo (aka \u2018HHP\u2019) and D\u2019banj, and football stars Benni McCarthy, Chris Katongo. The ads ask, \"What's the one thing the government can do to make the most difference for your family and friends?\" It's free to send and receive the texts to One as part of the campaign.\nThe online survey version of the campaign suggests affordable food, better job opportunities, education, gender equality, access to clean water and better health, among other improvements governments can undertake. \nThe You Choose campaign is part of the My World coalition, a U.N. effort to understand what citizens are most hoping to improve about their lives. One's findings will be presented in March to the U.N.'s High Level Panel in Bali, Indonesia.\nImage courtesy of Flickr, kiwanja"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2013/01/31/one-you-choose-campaign/>