In this article Nick Lunch (InsightShare Co-Founder & Co-Director) describes how the Biocultural Portal (currently working under the project name 'Conversations with the Earth), functions as a web based resource for Indigenous Peoples and other stewards of biocultural diversity to share participatory video promoting local solutions to preserve the worlds biocultural diversity. He argues how the project - as a process at grassroots level - challenges power inequality but is simultaneously empowering for government officials, UN officers, civil servants, donors, NGOs, activists and communities alike.
The Voice of the Batwa PHOTOSTORY is a detailed description of the process through which a group of Batwa, from various squatter camps in Uganda, created a powerful film documenting the discrimination and marginalisation they face.
The Batwa are an indigenous people of the Great Lakes region of tropical Africa. Formerly hunter-gatherers, they were expelled from their ancestral forests to make way for conservation and tourism projects. They experience extreme racial discrimination from their neighbours, poverty, landlessness and unequal access to education and healthcare.
'Voice of the Batwa' was planned and filmed by members of the Batwa people during a Participatory Video project facilitated by InsightShare. Part of this film was aired on Ugandan television as well as being screened to local and national politicians, donors and NGOs.
In this video three' Sport for a Better World' changemakers speak about what motivates them: Trevor Dudley, Director - The Kids League, Uganda; Felicite Rwemalika executive director - Association of Kigali Women in Sports, Rwanda; Heather Cameron, Executive Director – Boxgirls International, Berlin.
This short clip shows the Kisoro District Regional Commissioner make concrete commitments to help improve the situation for the Batwa people of South West Uganda, in particular helping them with land claims and rights to education.
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