Summary: Stretching over 4,000 miles across South America, the Amazon River has long defied human efforts to tame it. Not a single bridge crosses it, and not one dam halts its flow. This program visits urban centers on the banks of the Amazon and examines new attempts to harness-or exploit-the river's energy and natural abundance. The journey begins at Iquitos-a Peruvian city blighted by poverty and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Inhabiting a shrinking pocket of rainforest in Paraguay's Eastern Canindeyu Region, the Ache are one of South America's last hunter-gatherer societies-and in imminent danger of cultural extinction. This program presents an intimate portrait of the Ache in their natural habitat, focusing on the Gatu tribal group. Sequences filmed during extensive stays with the tribe reveal their customs and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Journeying to a remote land high in the Andean mountains, this program follows a team of adventurers and scientists on a perilous rescue mission. Their goal is not to save lost tourists or injured hikers but to rediscover forgotten cultures, ancient Inca ruins, and rare species of plants and animals. All of this work must be done before a massive highway, which will crisscross the South...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Home to more biodiversity than either Europe or North America, Costa Rica has shown the world how to benefit from the environment without destroying it. This program treks across the Central American nation with a spotlight on ecotourism and how it fits into Costa Rica's overall economy. Visits to a banana farm, a coffee plantation, the Monteverde Cloud Forest, and the Tortugero National Park...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Urban punks with green hair and green thumbs, the members of Tierra Viva transform toxic Mexican earth into vegetable gardens. Their actions make up one remarkable part of this wide-ranging Mexican odyssey. Depicting Michoacan farmers who are fighting the trend to move to the cities-and preserving the winter home of the monarch butterflies-the program also journeys to Magdalena Bay,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: When an 11-year-old Paraguayan boy named Silvino Talavera died from pesticide poisoning in 2003, his name became a rallying cry in the fight against intensive soya production. This program recounts the tragedy and the legal, political, and economic impact of "agritoxins" in Latin America. Opening with a poetically filmed reenactment and moving on to feature key players in the story, the film...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: When seasonal rains sweep across South America, the Amazon River and its tributaries overflow their banks to create an ecosystem unlike any other-a place where, for six months out of each year, land-dwellers and water-dwellers mingle. This program joins an expert Amazon biologist in a journey into the flooded forests of the Amazon Basin to film dolphins navigating through treetops, a male...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: A city shouldn't be a problem, says Jaime Lerner, the former mayor of Curitiba. "It should be a solution." This program explores innovative planning, engineering, and conservation at work in the Brazilian metropolis as it transcends many of the problems plaguing other South American cities. The film spotlights fully modernized public transportation and recycling systems, a "Citizenship Street"...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program examines how urbanization, industrialization, and overreaching agriculture are depleting the Earth of its natural resources. Citing environmental changes in Morocco, Ghana, Ukraine, Mexico, and Vietnam, the program studies the impact of population growth and profiles organizations that respond to ecological crises stemming from such growth. With a focus on educational outreach...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Among the largest, most pristine areas of tropical woodland on the planet, the Congo Basin forests could easily fall prey to shortsighted and exploitative commercial interests. This program looks at sustainable lumber production initiatives taking root in the region, with a focus on cutting-edge forestry management as well as economic growth through increased cooperation between local...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Use this program to correlate the precarious existence of endangered species and the forces of global trade. Visiting Indonesia, Japan, and the Florida Everglades, the video studies the difficulty of balancing economic and ecological well-being. The plight of animal populations-Sumatran elephants losing their habitat to palm oil plantations, Oriental white storks feeding in pesticide-ridden...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Transporting viewers to the year 2016, this program paints a disturbing picture of an oil-starved America and the socioeconomic upheaval that may accompany the death of the Oil Age. The film follows a middle-aged, Midwestern couple through violence at gas stations, conflicts with neighbors, and the loss of their livelihood; it also focuses on their daughter, an oil prospector determined to find...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Close to the Russian border, far removed from Mongolia's polluted and overcrowded capital city of Ulaanbaatar, an ancient herding culture fights to maintain its identity-and its survival. This program examines the nomadic communities of the Mongolian plains and their resistance to change, despite growing pressure on many herders to modernize and migrate to urban areas. Viewers meet some who...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Whether they arise from human causes or forces within planet Earth itself, natural disasters threaten life and civilization with what seems to be growing frequency. This album of NewsHour segments studies troubling developments in marine, arctic, wetland, and urban environments—highlighting research opportunities that may help prevent future catastrophes. Coral reef decay, Everglades habitat...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Our most valuable treasure, is how residents of Dakar describe the Bay of Han. But pollution from both residential and industrial sources is destroying the body of water that has long supported fishing families in the Senegalese capital. This program reports on Western-aided efforts to restore the bay's ecological health and its viability as an economic resource. Specific challenges include the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: In Ghana, olive baboons are ransacking crops and terrorizing villagers; in Namibia, a once-rich fishing ground is struggling to recover while toxic fumes explode from the ocean depths; in Puerto Rico, futuristic sub-sea fish farms are floating far from shore; and off the coast of Canada, migratory salmon are a part of a radical farming experiment. What do these seemingly unrelated scenarios...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: Climate change is a global phenomenon, but its effects are most clearly demonstrated on a regional level. This program connects the local and planetary aspects of global warming through environmental case studies, focusing on North Carolina's Outer Banks, South Carolina's coastal areas, and Florida's Everglades and Keys. Long-time residents of each state describe ecological changes they have...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2008
View online at AVOD
Summary: The UAE's oil is plentiful and readily consumed by an energy-thirsty world; meanwhile, the nation struggles with its own thirst for water. This program documents the history of the wealthy Arab nation and how it deals with water scarcity and an abundance of petroleum. Detailed discussions of the oil drilling and seawater desalinization processes, conversations with young UAE citizens, and a...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: Kyoto's immense underground spring has nourished Japan's former capital for more than a thousand years. This program illustrates how Kyoto's incomparable spring water has been integrated into the flow of the city's culture and industry, adding its purifying touch to the tea ceremony, festivals and religious rituals, the disparate arts of kimono-making and tofu-making, and the landscaping of the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Among the most utilized waterways in the world, the Yangtze River is also one of the most volatile. This program sheds light on humanity's battle to tame and profit from the river-specifically, a project initiated by Chiang Kai-shek in the 1930s. The program also studies corresponding ecological problems. Viewers are introduced to the Three Gorges Dam, a concrete mega-structure visible from...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2009
View online at AVOD
Summary: Having overtaken the U.S. as the world's biggest polluter, China is now responsible for 11 percent of all greenhouse gas production. Can the country reduce its carbon footprint without slowing its unprecedented economic growth? This program shows how that question is playing out in the Chinese construction industry, highlighting the creation and practical application of new homebuilding...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program focuses on three facets of the urban ecosystem: the underground infrastructure that enables a city to function; traffic and the increasingly complex technologies required to manage it; and the trees in the city and the ongoing effort to protect city trees from the effects of urban pollution.
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: East Africa's wild beauty may also be its greatest challenge. This program describes the ecological issues arising when a finite amount of land is needed for ever-growing human and animal populations. Where will Kenya's varied wildlife go when cities expand into age-old migration paths? How will farmers and cattle ranchers protect their land from invading animals? And how can a developing...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Although the social and economic conditions facing the Maasai people have changed significantly since this classic film was produced, it remains a valuable snapshot of the evolving interaction between an age-old culture, modern influences, and the striking natural surroundings of the Serengeti. Today's geography and anthropology students still stand to gain from the story of Tepilit Ole...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2010