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What's On

Tue 16th Mar 2010
	02:00	Towards Solutions
	02:30	Forests for the 21st Century
	02:50	Girl Stars
	03:00	Tree Fellers
	03:25	Untold Stories Shorts

full schedule

Villages on the Front Line

A billion people in a million villages live with the threat of their fields and pasture turning to dust. This series of eight programmes goes to the frontline to capture the environmental issues facing these communities.

Episode One: CARIBBEAN

Ecologist Carlos Lopez Alberto displays the contrasting fortunes of two countries in the Caribbean, Haiti and Costa Rica. In the densely populated area of Haiti the once beautiful landscape has slowly become a man made desert as 30 million tonnes of arable land disappears every year. On the other hand in Costa Rica the Government has sought to protect the land and established a network of reserves to encourage villages to protect the environment.

Episode Two: CHINA

In part two of this incredible series presenter Jennifer Wang takes us into the heart of Inner Mongolia to see the devastating effects of the encroaching deserts on the land as an area the size of Greenland is lost.

Destroyed farmland

Here she finds large scale mobilization as the government sets to reclaim a quarter of a million square kilometers of land lost to the desert by 2020. Adopting a top – down method China looks set to have halted the spread, but as Jennifer Wang finds out, in this part of China at least, little process has been made to stop the march of the desert. Villages on the Front Line looks first hand at the dimensions of this problem.

Episode Three: JORDAN

Water wastage in Jordan

In a country that receives less than 25 cms of rain a year, Jordan's demand for water is at a critical point. The only thing keeping the land from becoming a dry agricultural desert is the continuous work of its farmers. However the once sophisticated methods of using water sparingly have lapsed into disrepair. Now, the demand for water is so great that the Dead Sea itself is predicted to disappear. Jordanian TV reporter, Rula Amin goes in search of answers.

Episode Four: INDIA

Dried up Gujarat well

Along the coastal region of Gujarat, the human population has increased by 62% in just 20 years. In a land already consumed by farming and a need for water for domestic consumption the increasing population puts an unwanted strain on the land. As well as this the effects of seawater intrusion when the flow of salt water into wells pollutes the water, has risen to affect 1,125 kilometers of coastline and is spreading at an alarming rate of 550 square kilometers a year. This film goes in search of solutions to this silent crisis.

Episode Five: MOROCCO

Moroccan nomad

On average over nine million tourists are attracted to the sparse landscapes of the Moroccan Sahara every year. Brought on by the craze for rallies by the Paris – Dakar race, thousands of vehicles trample the land beneath them, causing severe damage to the fragile eco system. But it is not only the land affected here as Ali Sbai, born to a nomad family, describes how the surviving nomads of southern Morocco find their livelihoods on the line too.

Episode Six: NIGER

Planting trees to save village

Under the threat of being consumed by the desert, Niger, on the fringes of the Sahel displays a classic case of desertification. Villages such as Limandi have been abandoned to the dunes. However despite these problems there are those who have sought to change the fate of their villages, like the determined women of the Dan Saga Village who have planted trees to protect their fields and crops from the desert.

Episode Seven: SPAIN

Dried Spanish farmland

In Spain, where one third of the land is considered arid or semi arid, desertification is as big a threat to them as in less developed countries. The increasing number of tourists flocking to Spain is causing a strain on the land. As more water is given to supplying tourists with fresh showers, pools and golf courses the rise in illegal bore holes watering the semi arid areas to provide fruit crops to supermarkets in Northern Europe have risen. Alfredo Frenandez looks at the Spanish Governments plans to deal with these problems.

Episode Eight: TANZANIA

Tanzanian villager finding water

Following a stubborn drought in 2006 Tanzania found its self in the middle of a major water shortage. Local TV reporter Kanky Mwaigomile travels to the forests of the Eastern Arc Mountains in Tanzania, the water towers of the country, to see first hand the effects of illegal logging and charcoal making on the land.

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Last Updated ( Thursday, 26 November 2009 )

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