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Communications in 2002
Documentary
In support of the International Year of Mountains, the Television Trust for the Environment - the world's largest distributor of environment and development issues-based programming - produced four documentaries on mountains. These were shown first on BBC World's Earth Report in October, as part of a special 'mountain month' and were estimated to reach 220 million homes throughout the world.
Peak viewing on BBC World
Think of the world's hungriest populations - the 800 million or so who pass each night without enough to eat - and most of us recall television images of refugees fleeing armed conflict or children on the streets of urban slums. Now, a new documentary film produced for the International Year of Mountains challenges many of those deeply held assumptions. Taking viewers on a journey to some of the world's highest altitudes, The Angle on Hunger supports evidence that suggests mountain people share a disproportionate burden of chronic malnutrition and food insecurity.
Gregorio, for example, is a Peruvian farmer who lives in the Andes , 4 500 metres above sea level. Each day he wages war against gravity in an unrelenting battle to grow one of the only crops that will survive such extreme conditions - potatoes. Like many mountain dwellers, Gregorio eats as little as 70 percent of the calories he needs to maintain good health.
In the Ethiopian highlands, more than 3 000 metres above sea level, Aselefech is an out-of-work single mother who can't feed her children because her culture forbids her from ploughing her own land. Instead, she must hire a man to plough for her and, in return, pay him half of her harvest. As a consequence, she has only enough food to feed her children for three months of the year.
Getabelew lives in a world where the only thing he needs to survive is the one thing his country has run out of - land to farm. In many Ethiopian mountain communities, as much as 30 percent of the local population is now landless. To feed his family, Getabelew must work each day for food - often receiving just one small bundle of wheat.
"My babies will cry if there is not enough food," he says. "For us, we can hold the hunger, we can resist it, for the baby it's hard."
The experiences of Gregorio, Aselefech and Getabelew backs up new research released by the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). Although mountain people represent about 12 percent of the world's population, a multi-disciplinary FAO study suggests as much as half of the mountain population in the developing world and Commonwealth of Independent States - from 250 to 370 million people - is vulnerable to food insecurity and malnourishment.
The Angle on Hunger is produced and directed by Canadian filmmaker James Heer. The half-hour documentary was one of five programmes featured during "mountain month" on BBC World's Earth Report (October 2002).For futher information on the documentary and how to obtain a copy, visit : FAO NEWSROOM VIDEO
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