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Content

Globalization

Globalization


BACK TO THE FATHERLAND

Directors: Kat Rohrer, Gil Levanon

Back to the Fatherland is the story of young people leaving their home country to try their luck somewhere else... a universal tale in today's globalized world. The difference in this story is that these young people are moving from Israel to Germany and Austria - countries where their families were persecuted and killed less than a century ago.

This deeply human and revealing film explores the challenges and opportunities for reconciliation and understanding between the Third Generation on both sides of the Shoah.

DVD / 2018 / 77 minutes

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FREE LUNCH SOCIETY

By Christian Tod

What would you do if your income was taken care of?

Just a few years ago, an unconditional basic income was considered a pipe dream. Today, this utopia is more imaginable than ever before-intense discussions are taking place in all political and scientific camps.

FREE LUNCH SOCIETY provides background information about this idea and searches for explanations, possibilities and experiences regarding its implementation.

Globalization, automation, Donald Trump. The middle class is falling apart. One hears talk about the causes, rather than about solutions. Time for a complete rethinking:

An unconditional basic income means money for everyone - as a human right without service in return! Visionary reform project, neoliberal axe to the roots of the social state or socially romantic left-wing utopia? Depending on the type and scope, a basic income demonstrates very different ideological visions. Which side of the coin one sees depends on one's own idea of humankind: inactivity as sweet poison that seduces people into laziness, or freedom from material pressures as a chance for oneself and for the community. Do we actually need the whip of existential fear to avoid a lazy, depraved life in front of the TV set? Or does gainful employment give our lives meaning and social footing simply because we haven't known anything else for centuries? And because we've never all had the freedom to self-actualise in other ways?

That basic income is a powerful idea is indisputable: land, water and air are gifts of nature. They are different from private property that humans create by their individual effort. However, when we receive wealth from nature, from the commons, then that wealth belongs to all of us equally.

From Alaska's oil fields to the Canadian prairie, from Washington's think tanks to the Namibian steppes, the film takes us on a grand journey and shows us what the driverless car has to do with the ideas of a German billionaire and a Swiss referendum. FREE LUNCH SOCIETY, the first international film in cinemas about basic income, is dedicated to one of the most crucial questions of our times.

DVD (English, German, Color, Closed Captioned, With English Subtitles) / 2017 / 92 minutes

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PATRIMONIO

Directors: Lisa F. Jackson, Sarah Teale

A multi-billion dollar American development is poised to engulf a small coastal community in Mexico with a mega hotel/condo complex. But local people are banding together to save their way of life and the delicate ecosystem on which they all depend. This powerful yet intimate documentary reveals how rampant, unsustainable development is destroying communities, ecosystems and long-held ways of life all over the world - and how it can be stopped.

Rosario Salvatierra is a fourth generation fisherman in Todos Santos, a small desert town on the Pacific coast of Baja California Sur. For generations hundreds of fishermen have launched their boats into the sea directly from Punta Lobos, the beach just outside of town. But all that is about to change. As Rosario walks along the beach he is confronted by a massive sea wall and a concrete platform that stretches for hundreds of meters from the breakwater back towards the mountains. Thousands of mangroves that once protected the beach have been bulldozed, an arroyo backfilled, dunes flattened and a boutique hotel and massive tourist complex is being constructed on the site along with the first of a projected 4,472 homes, the residents of which will triple the population of the town.

It is all part of an American mega development, called Tres Santos, that threatens to transform and overwhelm the town of Todos Santos. The fishermen themselves are being pushed off the beach and the development would drain the already diminished aquifer, taking drinking water from a town where many residents already do not have access.

What are the rights of small, under-represented communities in the face of global business interests and unsustainable development and what can they do to stand up for those rights and their way of life? For the last year Rosario, who is one of the leaders of the Punta Lobos Fishermen's Cooperative, has been asking these questions and pushing the fishermen and the town to stand up for their rights. He is being supported by his 29 year-old daughter Maria Salvatierra and John Moreno, a young, charismatic Mexican lawyer.

The film follows the efforts of the Salvatierra family as they struggle to educate and organize their community against the developers and as well the efforts of Moreno to inform the fishermen of their legal rights as he takes on the municipal and then federal governments on their behalf. As Moreno slowly begins to succeed in his efforts to thwart the developers, they begin to target him in increasingly threatening and desperate ways. The developers, in collusion with local politicians, also attempt to divide the town, the fishermen and families and we watch as they work to stay united. As Rosario points out early on "we are taking on giants".

DVD (Spanish with English subtitles) / 2017 / 83 minutes

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WHEN BANANA RULED

By Mathilde Damoisel

Bananas are everywhere: Americans eat nearly 10 billion of them per year, consuming more pounds of bananas than apples and oranges combined.

WHEN BANANA RULED tells the story of the men who made bananas the most ubiquitous fruit in the world, through a multinational empire that dominated production and sales, overthrew governments, and created a business model still largely used by today's tech giants.

The story of bananas as commodities begins with a failed railway project started in Costa Rica in 1871, led by American Minor Cooper Keith. When the Costa Rican government defaulted on its payments to Keith for its construction, the businessman faced ruin. His salvation? Bananas. Keith would go on to co-found the United Fruit Company and within decades-after a concerted campaign led by the father of public relations, Edward Bernays-bananas became a staple of the North American diet. Animated mascot Miss Chiquita Banana was a pop culture icon, doctors recommended bananas as an ideal food for children, and bananas popped up in movies and Broadway musicals.

But, as WHEN BANANA RULED documents, the entire enterprise was built on a rapacious, imperialist business model that required the domination of countries including Guatemala, Honduras, and Colombia. United Fruit took over critical national infrastructure like railways and ports, rapidly expanded plantations by displacing small (often Indigenous) farmers, bought itself favorable legislation, and, like today's largest companies, sheltered profits offshore to avoid taxes.

Life on the plantations was a world within a world: A strict hierarchy with white managers from the best business schools, foremen from the US South (recruited for their knowledge of slavery), and black laborers paid largely in company food coupons and strictly forbidden to unionize. When a new, revolutionary government was formed in Guatemala, United Fruit's plantations were nationalized. What happened next came straight from the playbook that would dominate US foreign policy in the region: claim a Communist threat, persuade legislators back home of its dangers, bomb the country, and install a new, pro-American and pro-business regime.

Using a rich trove of archival footage and documents, including letters to and from lobbyists, telegrams, vintage ads and movie clips, and gorgeous, hand-tinted stills, WHEN BANANA RULED is a story of intrigue that touches on economics, international politics, the history of multinational business and reveals how an array of forces conquered the world through a simple fruit.

DVD (Color, Closed Captioned) / 2017 / 52 minutes

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FOOD FOR CHANGE: THE STORY OF COOPERATION IN AMERICA

Directed by Steve Alves

The deep history of cooperatives in America -- the country's longest-surviving alternative economic system.

FOOD FOR CHANGE looks at the current resurgence of food cooperatives in America and their unique historic place in the economic and political landscape. Born in the heartland, cooperatives are seen as the middle path between Wall Street and Socialism.

The film profiles several food co-ops that have revived neighborhoods and communities - right in the shadows of corporate agribusinesses and supermarket chains. It's an inspiring example of community-centered economies thriving in an age of globalization.

DVD / 2016 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 82 minutes

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WHEN TWO WORLDS COLLIDE

Directors: Heidi Brandenburg & Mathew Orzel

In this tense and immersive Sundance award-winner, audiences are taken directly into the line of fire between powerful, opposing Peruvian leaders who will stop at nothing to keep their respective goals intact. On the one side is President Alan Garcia, who, eager to enter the world stage, begins aggressively extracting oil, minerals, and gas from untouched indigenous Amazonian land. He is quickly met with fierce opposition from indigenous leader Alberto Pizango, whose impassioned speeches against Garcia's destructive actions prove a powerful rallying cry to throngs of his supporters. When Garcia continues to ignore their pleas, a tense war of words erupts into deadly violence.

DVD (Spanish with English subtitles) / 2016 / 103 minutes

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TRUE COST, THE

Directed by Andrew Morgan

Groundbreaking investigation of fast fashion reveals that while the price of clothing has been decreasing for decades the human and environmental costs have grown dramatically.

This is a story about clothing. It's about the clothes we wear, the people who make them, and the impact the industry is having on our world. The price of clothing has been decreasing for decades, while the human and environmental costs have grown dramatically. THE TRUE COST is a groundbreaking documentary film that pulls back the curtain on the untold story and asks us to consider, who really pays the price for our clothing?

Filmed in countries all over the world, from the brightest runways to the darkest slums, and featuring interviews with the world's leading influencers including Stella McCartney, Livia Firth, Vandana Shiva and Richard Wolff, THE TRUE COST is an unprecedented project that invites us on an eye opening journey around the world and into the lives of the many people and places behind our clothes.

DVD / 2015 / (Grades 10-12, College, Adult) / 92 minutes

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EUROPEAN UNION EXPLAINED, THE

  • The European Union
  • History
  • The EU Institutions
  • Arguments For And Against

    • Conceived as a noble cause, to prevent another war in Europe, the EU has become embroiled in controversy. But what is the EU? How does it work? Should we love it or hate it?

    THE HISTORY, THE STRUCTURE We trace the EU from its beginnings as a coal and steel trading agreement, through to the structure and institutions of today: the Commission, the Council, The European Parliament. Enlargement, and the single currency, have brought great changes - and crisis.

    CRISIS AND CONFLICT The world financial crash highlighted the divisions between the rich and poor members - and put great strain on the Eurozone. Why is there such a surge of euroscepticism across Europe and in UK especially? How will the EU fare against charges of corruption, bureaucratic waste and lack of democracy? We put all the arguments for viewers to decide.

    DVD / 2014 / 30 minutes

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    IMPACT OF GLOBALISATION: FOOD

  • Globalisation Of Food
  • Migrant labour in the EU
  • European Union

    • How the clean, bright displays in our supermarkets hide a murkier story of exploitation in the supply chain.

    ITALY'S ROTTEN TOMATOES If you buy a tin of tomatoes chances are they come from Southern Italy - picked by migrant labour usually from Africa. They're paid a pittance, have no rights and live in shacks. It looks like a third world scene, but this is in the heart of the EU. The Italian authorities are beginning to act against the gang masters, but the exploitation goes on.

    SLAVERY AT SEA Chinese and South Korean trawlers work the coast of East Africa, hiring local labour who work in slave-like conditions. The fish is not supposed to go to the EU but it does, by changing the labels on the boxes! EU officials say they try their best to guarantee the quality and source of the fish - but they are understaffed and admit that the law is frequently flouted.

    A BAD CASE OF BANANAS PHP is a French multi-national producing bananas for Europe - they claim their workforce is happy, but the crops are being sprayed with chemicals that have been banned in the EU. Local towns and villages have been affected - some workers have gone blind. What chance of change when the local politicians are working for the company?

    DVD / 2014 / 32 minutes

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    GRINGO TRAILS

    By Pegi Vail

    Are tourists destroying the planet-or saving it? How do travelers change the remote places they visit, and how are they changed? From the Bolivian jungle to the party beaches of Thailand, and from the deserts of Timbuktu, Mali to the breathtaking beauty of Bhutan, GRINGO TRAILS traces stories over 30 years to show the dramatic long-term impact of tourism on cultures, economies, and the environment.

    Directed by prominent anthropologist Pegi Vail, the Director of the Center for Media, Culture and History at New York University and a Fulbright Scholar, GRINGO TRAILS raises urgent questions about one of the most powerful globalizing forces of our time: tourism. Following stories along the well-worn western travelers' route-the 'gringo trail', through South America and beyond to Africa and Asia-the film reveals the complex relationships between colliding cultures: host countries hungry for financial security and the tourists who provide it in their quest for authentic experiences.

    As dramatically as travelers are altered by new landscapes, values and belief systems, they also alter the people and places they visit. A man getting lost in the Amazon jungle in 1981 has had an unexpected effect on future generations. The original inhabitant of an island on the Salt Flats of Bolivia faces the dilemma of trying to preserve its ecosystem while still allowing outsiders to experience its unique magic. A traveler's search for an "unspoiled" island paradise in Thailand has unintended but devastating consequences and poses ethical quandaries for locals in a position to profit from tourism. A woman's romantic fantasies about "the unknown" meet reality in Timbuktu. Locals worldwide express the desire for visitors to better understand how to respectfully walk on their sacred lands, including an indigenous community that has become a model for sustainable tourism in South America.

    GRINGO TRAILS experts include National Geographic Traveler editor Costas Christ; Jungle author Yossi Ghinsberg; travel essayist and novelist Pico Iyer; Bolivian Chalalan Ecolodge's Freddy Limaco and Guido Mamani; Globe Trekker host Holly Morris; Lonely Planet travel writer Anja Mutic; Vagabonding author Rolf Potts; A Map for Saturday's Brook Silva-Braga; National Museum director Kempo Tashi; travel writer Ernest "Fly Brother" White; and Royal Family of Bhutan member Dasho Sangay Wangchuk.

    DVD (Color, Closed Captioned) / 2013 / 79 minutes

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    LIFE APPS: FAVELA FARM (BRAZIL)

    Directed by Rodrigo Mac Niven

    In Brazil can Pedro build a Life App to help the secret world of urban farms and gardens in Rio's shanty towns?

    Pedro is part of a collective of young people in Rio de Janeiro working on new mobile phone technology. Social network apps can serve a dual purpose: They can increase awareness about a cause, and enable users to take action. Social apps help users feel they're making a difference. Pedro goes to Rio and meets Cadu and Dinho, who work on community projects in the Mare and Alemao favelas.

    The massive and uncontrolled growth of favelas is a major environmental issue in Rio. In Alemao and Mare alone there are more than 200,000 people, with few proper facilities. Cadu and Dinho are taking Pedro to meet young people from Rio's North Zone, learn about their lives, and research the possibilities for a new "Life App" that can help with green business initiatives in the favela community.

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 27 minutes

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    LIFE APPS: MOBILE HARVEST

    Directed by Arjun Pandey

    In India can Sachin build a Life App to help stem the tide of farmer suicides?

    Sachin Gaur is an award-winning software engineer and world-class expert in mobile security. In 2010 he cofounded the technology collective MixOrg, which aims to develop apps to help people at the bottom of the pyramid -- people like the many millions of India's poor farmers whose lives are often blighted by multiple problems.

    LIFE follow Sachin as he heads off to Andhra Pradesh to meet farmers and hear first-hand about the major obstacles they face in their lives -- from changing weather patterns and unreliable rainfall, to rising costs of seeds and fertilizers. With a firm grasp of some of their real-life problems, he's ready to start working on a "Life App" to help spread farmers' ideas.

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 27 minutes

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    LIFE APPS: ONCE A NOMAD (NAMIBIA)

    Directed by Abius Akwaake

    In Namibia can Dalton and Lameck build a Life App to help the illiterate and isolated Himba people market their goods?

    Otjomitjira village lies amidst a breathtaking landscape in northwestern Namibia. The Himba population here is less than seventy people; another of Namibia's tribes, the Herero, also live here alongside oases of fresh water, making a living off the land with their own cattle. You can't get more isolated than the Himba people. They wear few clothes, some jewelry...and carry cell-phones! They're dubious that LIFE APPS can help them: elephant warning systems, tracking cattle -- there are plenty of potential applications.

    Poor signal strength is one problem; another is that many phones are only 2G. And although the women can't read, they use icons to recognise numbers. Software developers Dalton and Lameck, from Namibia's capital Windhoek, are determined to persuade the Himba that they can help them with a mobile phone app that will help them market their goods and communicate more effectively.

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 27 minutes

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    LIFE APPS: SILICON SAVANNAH (KENYA)

    Directed by Toni Kamau

    In Kenya can Muniu build a Life App to help William be as good a farmer as he can be?

    Muniu Kariuki is an app developer living in Nairobi. With friends, he runs Bityarn Consult, a small technology start-up. In this program, Muniu takes up the challenge of seeing if he can develop a "Life App" that can help small Kenyan farmer William, who runs a subsistence farm in rural Ugenya, 300 miles from Nairobi. William is an expert on cultivating traditional African vegetables, but would like his modest farm to be more productive and profitable.

    In western Kenya, the Technology Adoption Through Research Organization (TATRO) has mobilized farmers into growing traditional indigenous vegetables, but the old physical problems of communication make it a tough challenge. Can Muniu come up with an app that can help William reach out for new business opportunities?

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 27 minutes

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    LIFE APPS: WORLD OF APPS (UK/SOUTH AFRICA)

    Directed by Paul Zisiwe, Gautam Lewis

    Young people are writing apps to solve problems from reproductive health care in South Africa to helping young minority adults in London who are "stopped and searched."

    The final episode of the series profiles Apps For Good, an organization originally started in Brazil to harness young people's ideas and energies to develop apps that can benefit local communities. In South Africa, LIFE visits with creative artist Nanziwe, who works for the mobile start-up company Bozza and is trying to develop an "app" to provide young people with sexual and reproductive health information and advice.

    In London's East End, LIFE films one young entrepreneur who has developed an app that helps young minority adults who are "stopped and searched" by the police, recording their locations and their accounts of the treatment they receive. We also visit with Amarah, a young student from Central Foundation Girls' School, who has developed her own "app" to send messages to friends with an alarm call.

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 27 minutes

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    XMAS WITHOUT CHINA

    Directed by Alicia Dwyer
    Featuring: Tom Xia

    Exploring the intersection of consumerism and immigration in American culture, XMAS WITHOUT CHINA is an intimate portrait of families wrestling with our drive to consume cheap products, but also with our desire for human connection and a sense of who we are in a fast-changing world.

    Pride and mischief inspire Chinese immigrant Tom Xia to challenge the Americans in his Southern California suburb to celebrate Christmas without any Chinese products. With deep ties to his extended family back home, Tom is incensed by how he considers China is misunderstood, particularly by the American media. But he gets more than he bargains for when he meets the Joneses, a young family trying to keep their children safe as a wave of Chinese toy recalls forces them to have their son tested for lead poisoning.

    The Joneses start to give up not just toys, plates, lamps, and clothes, but the beloved hair dryer, coffeemaker, X-Box, and many Christmas decorations, challenging the way they live everyday life and how they celebrate Christmas. Meanwhile, Tom's parents are constructing a new home, proudly using Chinese materials to build their American dream. As they decorate for Christmas for the first time and the interactions between the Xias and the Joneses intensify, Tom realizes that he's on a deeper journey to understand the complexities of his own divided loyalties between America and China.

    DVD / 2013 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 63 minutes

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    DETROPIA

    Directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady

    A vivid portrait of Detroit, America's first major post-industrial city, as it struggles to deal with the consequences of a broken economic system.

    Detroit's story has encapsulated the iconic narrative of America over the last century...the Great Migration of African Americans escaping Jim Crow; the rise of manufacturing and the middle class; the love affair with automobiles; the flowering of the American dream; and now the collapse of the economy and the fading American mythos.

    With its vivid, painterly palette and haunting score, DETROPIA sculpts a dreamlike collage of a grand city teetering on the brink of dissolution. These soulful pragmatists and stalwart philosophers strive to make ends meet and make sense of it all, refusing to abandon hope or resistance. Their grit and pluck embody the spirit of the Motor City as it struggles to survive postindustrial America and begins to envision a radically different future.

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 10-12, College, Adult) / 86 minutes

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    FUTURE FOOD: NEAR OR FAR? (NIGERIA)

    Directed by Remi Vaughan Richards

    The Nigerian Minister for Agriculture wants to ensure Nigerians eat food grown in Nigeria.

    The proponents of globalization suggest we buy our food from the cheapest sources, no matter where in the world that might be. Now that food prices are rising again, countries rich and poor have begun to reconsider the price of imported food and many governments, from Brazil to Micronesia, are setting quotas in support of local food production.

    Nigeria, the world's seventh most populous country, is one of the world's largest food importers. The charismatic Akinwunmi Ayo Adesina, Nigerian Minister for Agriculture, believes it is his job to ensure Nigerians eat food grown in Nigeria. Experts say the Minister's plans could be a model for other African nations. But do people really want to eat only food grown at home? What impact do food policies have on the local economy and local diets? And in a globalized world, is self-sufficiency really the answer?

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 29 minutes

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    LA CAMIONETA: THE JOURNEY OF ONE AMERICAN SCHOOL BUS

    Directed by Mark Kendall

    The transformation of an old American school bus into a brightly-colored public bus in Guatemala speaks volumes about our globalized world.

    Every day dozens of decommissioned school buses leave the United States on a southward migration that carries them to Guatemala, where they are repaired, repainted, and resurrected as the brightly-colored camionetas that bring the vast majority of Guatemalans to work each day. Since 2006, nearly 1,000 camioneta drivers and fare-collectors have been murdered for either refusing or being unable to pay the extortion money demanded by local Guatemalan gangs.

    La Camioneta follows one such bus on its transformative journey: a journey between North and South, between life and death, and through an unfolding collection of moments, people, and places that serve to quietly remind us of the interconnected worlds in which we live.

    DVD (Closed Captioned) / 2012 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 72 minutes

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    YOU'VE BEEN TRUMPED

    Directed by Anthony Baxter

    In this David and Goliath story for the 21st century, a group of proud Scottish homeowners take on a celebrity tycoon. At stake is one of Britain's very last stretches of wilderness.

    American billionaire Donald Trump has bought up hundreds of acres on the northeast coast of Scotland, best known to movie-lovers as the setting for the 1983 classic film LOCAL HERO. And like the American oil tycoon played by Burt Lancaster, he needs to buy out a few more locals to make the deal come true. In a land swimming with golf courses, Trump is going to build two more - alongside a 450-room hotel and 1,500 luxury homes. The trouble is, the land he has purchased occupies one of Europe's most environmentally sensitive stretches of coast, described by one leading scientist as Scotland's Amazon rain forest. And the handful of local residents don't want it destroyed.

    After the Scottish Government overturns its own environmental laws to give Trump the green light, the stage is set for an extraordinary summer of discontent, as the bulldozers spring into action. Water and power is cut off, land disputes erupt, and some residents have thousands of tonnes of earth piled up next to their homes. Complaints go ignored by the police, who instead arrest the film's director, Anthony Baxter. Local exasperation comes to a surreal head as the now "Dr." Trump scoops up an honorary doctorate from a local university, even as his tractors turn wild, untouched dunes into fairways.

    Told entirely without narration, YOU'VE BEEN TRUMPED captures the cultural chasm between the glamorous, jet-setting and media savvy Donald Trump and a deeply rooted Scottish community. What begins as an often amusing clash of world views grows increasingly bitter and disturbing. For the tycoon, the golf course is just another deal, with a possible billion dollar payoff. For the residents, it represents the destruction of a globally unique landscape that has been the backdrop for their lives.

    Funny, inspiring and heartbreaking in turns, YOU'VE BEEN TRUMPED is both an entertaining, can't-believe-it's-true tale and an environmental parable for our celebrity driven times. A moving score features music from jónsi, the internationally acclaimed musician and frontman of Sigur Rós. The film also offers a rare and revealing glimpse of the unfiltered Donald Trump, as he considers standing as a candidate for President of the United States.

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 9-12, College, Adult) / 95 minutes

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    ZERO TEN TWENTY: HAYLEY, ROSAMARIA, ANGELA AND MARTENS

    Directed by Bruno Sorrentino

    Revisits four children in England, Brazil, Papua New Guinea, and Latvia, who were born in 1992, the year of the first Rio Earth Summit, and measures the impact of globalization on their lives.

    Hayley was born into a coal-mining community in Merseyside, UK. When the mines closed down, her father lost his job, and her parents divorced. Rosamaria was born into an extended family in the violent and dangerous favela of Rocinha, in Rio de Janeiro. The drugs are gone, police 'pacification' has transformed Rocinha, and Rosamaria's a single mom with a new boyfriend, trying to find a job.

    Angela was born on Lihir Island, in Papua New Guinea, just as a gold mine was about to be built. Twenty years later, the mine has brought huge benefits to Lihirians, but also pollution. Martens was born in Jelgava, on the outskirts of the Latvian capital Riga, after the collapse of the Soviet Union. After joining the European Union in 2000, Latvia's economy had been hit hard by the Eurocrisis; Marten's own dream is to become a chef.

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 48 minutes

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    ZERO TEN TWENTY: PANJY, AMELIA, JUSTIN AND VUSUMZI

    Directed by Bruno Sorrentino

    Revisits four children in India, Norway, and South Africa, who were born in 1992, the year of the first Rio Earth Summit, and measures the impact of globalization on their lives.

    In south India, Panjy was born into a community dependent on the local fireworks industry. As a child, she was determined to finish her education -- but family debt intervened; she was forced to quit school, and later had an arranged marriage. In north Norway, Amelia was born into a remote cod-fishing community on the edge of the Arctic. But the fishing industry gave way to tourism in the 1990s, when fishing quotas were introduced, and Amelia worked as a waitress. Now she's desperate to get away and experience life outside of her remote home town.

    On the other side of the world, in South Africa, we catch up with Justin, who is forging a new future for himself as an undergraduate at Cape Town University far from his parents' farm in the Eastern Cape. Tragedy has struck down Vusumzi, our second South African `Earth Summit' child -- tragically killed in a senseless act of violence three years ago. His mother Mavis recounts what happened and then, amazingly, forgives his killer.

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 50 minutes

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    ZERO TEN TWENTY: STEPHANIE, ERDO AND KAY-KAY

    Directed by Bruno Sorrentino

    Revisits three children in the United States, Kenya, and China, who were born in 1992, the year of the first Rio Earth Summit, and measures the impact of globalization on their lives.

    In California, Stephanie's father worked as a logger, caught up in the 1992 controversy surrounding the spotted owl and logging taking place in the bird's habitat. Today, Stephanie's still an outdoor girl -- rodeo riding, fishing, shooting, and accompanying her truck driver boyfriend on the road.

    Erdo was the eighth child born into a nomadic Turkana family in the drought-ridden north of Kenya. Despite his mother Esther's heroic efforts to ensure his education, a teenage Erdo drifted into living with street gangs in the local town of Isiolo until Esther tracked him down and persuaded him to return to school, where he's now training to be a mechanic.

    Our final `Earth Summit' child, Kay-Kay, was born in the city of Guangzhou just as China's economy was taking off. A star pupil at school, Kay-Kay's now an undergraduate at a brand new university on the outskirts of the city, but still goes home to see her parents and sing karaoke with them on the weekends.

    DVD / 2012 / (Grades 7-12, College, Adult) / 50 minutes

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    BITTER SEEDS

    Directed by Micha X. Peled

    The final film in Micha X. Peled's Globalization Trilogy examines the epidemic of suicides amongst India's cotton farmers, deeply in debt after switching to genetically modified seeds.

    As industrial agriculture spreads around the world, many small-scale farmers are losing their land. Nowhere is the situation more desperate than in India, where every 30 minutes one farmer, deep in debt and unable to provide for his family, commits suicide. It's an epidemic, which has claimed over a quarter million lives.

    Following a U.S. complaint to the World Trade Organization, India had to open its doors to foreign seed companies like the U.S.-based Monsanto. Now only genetically modified (GM) seeds for some major crops are available at the seed shops. The GM seeds are much more expensive; in addition to precious water, they need additional fertilizers and insecticides and must be re-purchased every season. Large farms have prospered, but the majority of farmers are now struggling to make a living off their land.

    Ram Krishna, a cotton farmer at the epicenter of the suicide crisis region, is struggling to keep his land. Manjusha, the neighbors' daughter, is determined to overcome village traditions and become a journalist. Ram Krishna's plight becomes her first assignment.

    BITTER SEEDS raises critical questions about the human cost of genetically modified agriculture and the future of how we grow things.

    DVD / 2011 / (Grades 10-12, College, Adult) / 88 minutes

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    IMPACT OF GLOBALISATION 3: THE CAR MAKERS

    The car was once a symbol of American ingenuity and technological progress. But globalisation is having a huge impact on both how it's produced and on the lives of the people in the complex networks of countries across the world involved in its production.

    INDIA: In Chennai, India, Boniface works making radiator caps which will end up on a US pick-up truck. The global car industry has given him a good job and great hopes for his future and that of his family.

    BRITAIN: In West Bromwich, UK, Brian's firm supplies springs and washers to Boniface's company to make the caps for the pick-up truck. But Brian sees his business under increasing pressure from companies outsourcing production to India and China.

    AMERICA: In Tennessee, USA, Teresa's company makes the radiators for the pick-up truck - but loses her job because of global competiton.

    "Everybody is competing with everybody," she says. "They are doing what they need to do to survive - but we don't have to like it."

    CHINA: But when it comes to global competition, there's one country no one can afford to ignore - China, the new Detroit of the world car industry. Car companies aren't only moving into China to make goods for export, but also to meet local demand for cars - the new status symbol in one of the world's newest economies.

    The rise of foreign car companies and global networks of suppliers raises the question - what now is an American car? Is there such a thing? Some countries are winning, some losing - but no one can predict the ultimate direction of the global car industry.

    DVD / 2010 / 30 minutes

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    IMPACT OF GLOBALISATION 2: USA, CHINA & EUROPE

    Three films look at how countries around the world are feeling the bitter effects of globalisation.

    USA: Detroit, the city of Motown music and big cars is turning into an industrial wasteland.

    When the car industry was booming Detroit was the fifth largest city in the US. But now Japanese and other foreign car companies have taken more and more of the US market.

    General Motors, whose headquarters are in Detroit, was once the world's biggest car maker, but now it's a shadow of its former self, and has been bailed out by the US government.

    Businesses are being killed off and residents have fled the city. Car workers who thought they had secure jobs, are facing the reality that the wheels are falling off Motor City. Now General Motors is gambling its future on more environmentally friendly cars.

    CHINA: This once booming supplier of cheap goods to the world is now seeing factories close their doors and workers fired and sent back to their poor villages.

    A watch factory owner says: "I have been in the watch business for forty years. This is the most difficult time I've ever seen."

    The Chinese government has set up a four thousand billion yuan program to help big companies and revive the economy, but smaller enterprises are still going bust.

    In China's poorer rural areas, leaving for work in the city has become a way of life for young people - a way of life that suddenly seems far more precarious.

    EUROPE: 2300 Nokia employees have been laid off following the factory's move to Romania.

    Despite record profits, the mobile-phone maker's move to Romania is spurred by the search for cheap labour. Says one German worker: "The company has exploited us. They have taken us for a ride - and that's putting it mildly.'

    But in Romania many welcome the move - they see Nokia as a new source of jobs and economic growth. The Romanian village of Jucu has been renamed Nokia Village and the mayor is planning what to do with the new income.

    But how much will Nokia actually pay their new Romanian workers? And how long before Nokia goes elsewhere in search of cheap labour? The film offers a fascinating example of the ups and downs of "caravan capitalism".

    DVD / 2009 / 46 minutes

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    IMPACT OF GLOBALISATION 1: BHUTAN

    Globalisation is having a huge impact on countries across the world. But not all countries have bought into the consumerist dream. This film is about Bhutan -- a country pursuing an alternative economic path.

    Bhutan is a tiny country in the Himalayas bordering on China and India. Until recent years it's been off-limits to outsiders and out of touch with the outside world.

    People have little material wealth but the country claims to be achieving unique levels of contentment. The people's Buddhist faith and the way they live in harmony with their environment, it seems, have been the foundations of their "gross national happiness". Visitors come here to discover the secret of their happiness.

    But in recent years things have begun to change. Tourism has become big business. People are leaving the countryside and the cities are growing.

    Perhaps most dramatically television has come to Bhutan, bringing with it 46 channels exposing people to advertising and programmes from all over the world.

    On the positive side people can now understand discuss world events. On the down side consumerism is taking off.

    New fashions, pop music, mobile phones are appearing. Electronic goods and cosmetics are coming to the shops. Traditional dress is giving way to trendy T-shirts. Young people are becoming more violent. Drugs and AIDS have become significant problems.

    People are worried that young people are neglecting Buddhism for computer games and Nike. People are working harder to buy material goods and there are fears that community life is breaking down.

    How will the forces of globalisation affect this unique mountain kingdom? Will they be able to retain their happiness despite the forces of globalisation?

    DVD / 2008 / 30 minutes

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    ARGENTINA: TURNING AROUND

    An intimate view of new models of work, politics and community development in Argentina.

    In the 90s Argentina embraced globalization, but instead of making everyone rich the economy collapsed. The eyes of the world were on Argentina as a desperate people turned to each other for mutual support in a remarkable outpouring of grassroots organizing. Now, several years later, have there been fundamental changes, or is it business as usual?

    From the producers of Argentina: Hope in Hard Times, comes a new film that re-visits worker-run factories, and talks with journalists, economists, and unemployed workers. ARGENTINA: TURNING AROUND provides an intimate view of the new models of work, politics and community development that are now underway, as people re-invent their society to offer a better life for all.

    DVD (Color, Closed Captioned) / 2007 / (Grades 9-12, College, Adult) / 38 minutes

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    BUYER BE FAIR: THE PROMISE OF PRODUCT CERTIFICATION

    Looks at the benefits of fair trade goods and product certification for people and the environment.

    Under the auspices of the WTO, globalization of world trade seems like a juggernaut that will not be stopped. But is there a way to make trade FAIR? How can retailers and consumers use their purchasing power and market choice to make the world better for people and the environment? What is the promise of product certification and labeling?

    BUYER BE FAIR looks at two major trade goods -- timber and coffee -- to find out how certification works and whether it helps the world's poor, and their lands. Can the lessons from certification of timber, by the Forest Stewardship Council, and coffee, by Fair Trade, be applied to other products?

    BUYER BE FAIR takes viewers to Mexico, the Netherlands, the UK, Sweden, the USA and Canada, where compelling stories and characters raise and answer these questions in a powerful documentary that explores new ways to make globalization work for all of us.

    DVD (Color) / 2006 / (Grades 9-12, College, Adult) / 57 minutes

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    WE FEED THE WORLD

    Vividly reveals the dysfunctionality of the industrialized world food system and shows what world hunger has to do with us.

    Close to a billion of the nearly seven billion people on Earth are starving today. But the food we are currently producing could feed 12 billion people. This is a film about food and globalization, fishermen and farmers, the flow of goods and cash flow -- a film about scarcity amid plenty.

    Why doesn't a tomato taste like a tomato today? How does one explain that 200 million people in India, supplier of 80% of Switzerland's wheat, suffer from malnutrition? Why are thousands of acres of the Amazon being cleared to grow soybeans? Is water something to which the public has a basic right or, as the CEO of the world's largest food company Nestle suggests, a foodstuff with a market value?

    These distressing questions are addressed as filmmaker Erwin Wagenhofer travels from Austria to Brazil, France to Romania to interview Jean Ziegler, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, CEOs and directors of the world's largest food companies, agronomists, biologists, fishermen, farmers and farmworkers.

    On a daily basis, in Vienna alone, enough left-over bread to supply a small city is destroyed. The planet has enough production power to feed everyone, but 800 million people suffer from hunger. What does world hunger have to do with us?

    DVD (Color, Closed Captioned, German With English Subtitles) / 2005 / (Grades 10-12, College, Adult) / 96 minutes

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    IMPACTS OF GLOBALIZATION

    This program investigates economic growth and development, differences in development levels across the global economy, international convergence, and the environmental consequences of globalization. It features a case study of the impact of globalization on the Republic of Ireland.

    DVD / 2004 / 22 minutes

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    SENATOR OBAMA GOES TO AFRICA

    Director: Bob Hercules & Keith Walker

    Part personal odyssey and part chronicle of diplomacy in action, this timely documentary follows Senator Barack Obama as he travels to the land of his ancestry. From South Africa to Kenya to a Darfur refugee camp in Chad, Obama explores the vast continent that is gaining increasing importance in this age of globalization.

    The heart of the film is Obama's emotional homecoming to Kisumu, Kenya - his father's former home - where thousands of people turn out to greet him. In South Africa, we follow Senator Obama on a trip to Robben Island - the infamous prison where Nelson Mandela was jailed for 21 years. At a Darfur refugee camp in Chad, we see, through Obama's eyes, the devastating effects of genocide.

    Throughout it all, Senator Obama narrates the film, giving his own perspective on the journey and the significance of Africa to U.S. interests.

    Additional perspective is included through interviews with experts on African affairs as well as with U.S. political commentators.

    DVD (Color) / 52 minutes

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    WHERE IS THE WORLD GOING, MR. STIGLITZ?

    Director: Jacques Sarasin

    Simply and eloquently, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz explains how the world's economy works. Drawing not only from his academic expertise but also from time spent on the ground in countries around the world, Stiglitz offers fresh thinking about the questions and challenges facing all of us - from well-off Americans to those mired in Third World poverty.

    This five part series will appeal to experts and non-experts alike, as Stiglitz's clear and concise reasoning about the complexities of globalization is revealed. The topics covered include an overview of the world economy; the challenge of global warming and the environment; the future of global trade and immigration; how globalization can benefit (and harm) developing countries; and issues of security and terrorism.

    Jospeh Stiglitz is one of the most respected economists in the world today. Some of his positions and achievements include:

    Winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics
  • Chairman of Bill Clinton's Council of Economic Advisors
  • Chief Economist at the World Bank
  • Chair of the Management Board of the Brooks World Poverty Institute
  • Consultant to World Leaders
  • Professor at Yale, Princeton, Oxford, Stanford and (currently) Columbia University
  • Author of the Best-Selling Book Globalization and Its Discontents (translated into 35 languages) and its followup Making Globalization Work
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    2 DVDs / 380 minutes

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