Duck Call

If you don’t already know who Jamie Oliver is, chances are you soon will (for better or worse…)

Jamie’s a British celebrity chef on a crusade against the obesity epidemic. He wants everyone – from British school kids to ‘ordinary’ British people, and now, all of America – to ditch junk food and learn to cook healthy, happy, sustainable meals. On February 10, he won the 2010 TED prize for “transforming the way we feed our children” and at the end of March he has a new show starting on ABC about bringing his “food revolution” to America.

Being a Brit, I’ve known about Jamie Oliver for about 10 years, and have seen him change from a lone cheeky (read: annoying) TV chef into a global brand and powerful healthy food advocate (it’s widely accepted that his 2004 school lunch campaign was the catalyst for the UK government’s overhaul of school food spending and standards over the past five years).

He now not only has 10 cookbooks in print, a magazine in his own name and an MBE (that’s a shiny badge awarded by the Queen for services to her country), but he also has a foundation that helps disadvantaged young people learn a trade in the restaurant industry, and three ongoing campaigns to get healthy food to more and more people.

“That’s all well and good,” I hear you say, “but what’s it got to do with nonprofit communication?” Three things, that’s what:

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