Campaigning works: Success stories
When you campaign with Oxfam Ireland you are making a difference.
People in rural Zambia now have free healthcare - thanks to debt cancelled after Make Poverty History. Ethiopian coffee farmers get a fairer deal from Starbucks. Thousands of people have been saved from death from landmines.
Without people like you campaigning, we couldn't have achieved any of it. Of course, there is still a long way to go - trade still isn't fair, climate chaos threatens poor people first and hardest.
If you haven't already, sign up as a campaigner today.
Starbucks: What's in a name?
In 2006, Oxfam kicked off an international campaign to encourage Starbucks and other coffee roasters to work with Ethiopian coffee farmers. We demanded that the firm give the farmers a fairer share of the profits for their world-renowned coffee varieties.
More than 96,000 supporters, including many in Ireland, called on Starbucks to sign a licensing agreement. Their emails, faxes, phone calls, postcards, and in-store visits helped bring global attention to the issue.
Thanks to campaigners and customer pressure, Starbucks signed a distribution, marketing and licensing agreement that ended the trademark dispute and brings them together in partnership to help Ethiopian coffee farmers.
Watch the Ethiopian farmers thank you for your support 
People before profits: Novartis
In 2005, cancer patient groups in India used Indian intellectual property law to stop a patent application by Swiss drug company Novartis for its anti-cancer drug, Glivec (an important drug that means the difference between life and death for cancer patients suffering from leukemia [CML], stomach tumors, and other conditions) This allowed Indian companies to continue making generic versions at about $2,700 a year, as opposed to Novartis having a monopoly priced version for sale at about $27,000 a year.
Novartis responded with a legal appeal which challenged India 's right to interpret intellectual property rules in a way that protects the health of its citizens.
On 5 August 2007 an Indian court ruled against Novartis' challenge to India 's right to interpret intellectual property. The decision will protect India 's special role as the world's leading provider of affordable medicines to the poor. If Novartis had won the case, it would have resulted in patents being given drugs that are merely small modifications of existing ones, and stop generic competition: putting vital medicines out of reach for poor people around the world.
Act Now 
Campaigns Stories 