The people of Turkana will give simple and humane stories of the threat of the Gibe Dam Project to their livelihoods and will make 2min mini series and later compile an 11min documentary. Through online sharing and push to funders and relevant organizations, the voices of the indigenous community will be heard and hopefully halt the process until sustainable measures are put up to save the largest desert lake. It derives 90% of its water from R.Omo & provides livelihood to about 300,000 pastoralists and fishermen. In the initial stages(3 yrs), water flow into the lake will be curtailed by 70%.
Topical focus:
Country:
What locality or neighborhood will your project focus on?
Turkana
Describe the specific population with whom you will be working.
Turkana tribe is the second largest pastoral community in Kenya. With a population of about 300,000 people, the community is under-developed has only 5% electricity from the national grid let alone internet access which is only available in small towns in cyber cafes. They inspired the film project due to their tenacious efforts to save their lake from the Gibe Damming Project. The community will ultimately be the key people featured in the documentary because of the direct threat posed to L. Turkana and their livelihoods. The documentary is meant to pass awareness and close the knowledge gap on the importance and future existence of L. Turkana. The internet technology access is low but with the net enabled mobile phones, computer literacy and internet access is developing
Who else will be on your team to help implement the project?
We Project Survival Media (http://www.projectsurvivalmedia.org/about/what-we-do/) have partnerships with a host of environmental organisations that will help push the media online.
Friends of Lake Turkana (http://friendsoflaketurkana.org/)
Ikal Angelei, won the Goldman Environmental Prize in 2012 for her efforts in fighting to save L.Turkana (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikal_Angelei)
Internatinal Rivers (http://www.internationalrivers.org/resources/ethiopia-s-gibe-iii-dam-sowing-hunger-and-conflict-2643)
What kinds of news, stories and other content will be created?
The 2 minutes mini documentaries will get indigenous stories of the people’s interaction, dependency and experiences with the lake with the documentary capturing that and the awareness the people Turkana have on the new developments happening up-stream River Omo. Pictures of indigenous people, photo-documentaries of family’s lifelines and threats to them,Two 2min mini documentaries and an 11 minute documentaries will be produced by the end of the Project timeline. These will be shared through social media, blogs and partners websites
What technologies and digital tools do you plan to use in the trainings?
Describe the connections that you or your organization have already established or plan to establish that will contribute to the success of the project.
Project Survival Media have networks Friends of Lake Turkana, Ikal Angelei through it's networks with International Rivers. The organization is by indigenous people and has a huge knowledge bank of the activities of the Gibe, past and future plans, threats to the people and the specific measures taken by the community to protect their ecosystem thus far.
We plan on working with International Rivers who have shown keen interest in the indigenous people of the R. Omo including the Mursi and have made photo-documentary. They have shown interest in helping to furnish us with information and networks to push visual media created out of this project.
We hope to establish networks with UNESCO as Lake Turkana is a Ramsar site and an important point in the Europe -Africa Bird Migratory Route.
How many participants do you think will be trained in your project?
We hope to have 20 participants from the Turkana community who will introduce us to the most knowledgeable people in their community who can share the stories of their interaction with the lake ecosystem.
The people will be incorporated in to Friends of Lake Turkana (FoLT) they'll be trained on the powerful influence of visual media and the use of social media to promote their message to the relevant audiences.
Their participation will be retained by assigning roles in the film-making process. We will also offer small stipends to ensure they are compensated for food and transport to-fro sites. Moreover, we will create networks with them and the local environmental group (FoLT) so they are encouraged to continue even after the project is done.
Describe which technologies, tools, and media you will focus on when training participants.
We have been creating small documentaries on the climate change solutions and documenting environmental movements across the world from Kenya, to India to USA etc. We would bring skills in Photography, Story building and Filmmaking in activism. Our Filmakers, directors and social media experts will train the participants on how to build stories that capture public's interest while passing important messages in a powerful visual way that people can endear to.
Visual media in digital campaigning is a tool that has grown in popularity in the last few years with a boom in social media especially with web pages like Upworthy, Viralnoval, Engage Media dedicated to short documentaries.
It is necessary that participants learn skills for making citizens media for communicating their own stories.
Describe the facilities where you will hold the workshops.
The command center of the project will be in a conference room at the Friends of Turkana offices. The set-up of will consist of at least 12 desktop computers and 5 Laptops connected online via USB Modems with speed roughly between 0.5 Mbps and1.5Mb dependent on the strength of the GSM signal to the cell mast. Since more of the project will be done out-doors so as to involve the community, the command center will serve as a planning and coordinating point of the day’s activities as well the coordinating center of the crew at the field and the crew editing the raw content coming in from the field. The command center will also have audio-visual presentation equipment like projectors and sound equipment.
What is your current relationship with the community with whom you plan to work? What makes you the most appropriate individual or organization to implement this project?
By being a young Kenyan visual media making organization, we are the best matched to implement this project. We have followed the work of people who have been in the front-lines of activism in the Lake Turkana – Gibe issue and thus are well averse with the situation.
By being local, we understand the cultural customs of the Turkana people and thus we are able to present their story without losing dignity and respect of the people.
We have worked with various remote communities in Kenya and therefore understand the dynamics of working in remote areas in Kenya where electricity is a challenge, let alone internet access.
We hope that the skills we equip the participants will help them acquire more knowledge of the world outside the realms of Turkana and learn of other activists.
What specific challenges do you expect to face when planning and implementing your project?
Language barrier will be a problem since Turkana is only 1 of the 44 languages in Kenya. However, we will partner with various individuals from Friends of Lake Turkana with good knowledge of both local dialect and English as from the initial planning process. The project team will also be faced with a transportation challenge as this will involve a three day continuous drive with most of the road being off road gravel roads. These will be overcome by hiring 4WD vehicles. Electricity might be a huge issue but we hope to hire generators if at all this issue occurs. We will carry out prior background checks to avoid any customary differences in our conduct and ensure respect to elders at all times.
How will you measure and evaluate the project’s impact, specifically: your primary participants, the wider regional community, or the global digital community?
Schedule – If the project will be complete under the specified time line.
Scope – Whether the project will cover the anticipated scope of target audiences.
A) In the field, success will be measured by the quality of interviews made and the quality of footage for the documentaries.
B)Post-production – This will be measured by number of hit counts on environmental blogs and discussions that spark out of the material being shared out on social media.
Budget – Strict adherence to budget limits to the budget will be the evaluating factor.
Team satisfaction – By turn over numbers of participants, their motivational levels and the sustenance of their participation.
Overall – That relevant organizations receive messages from the indigenous communities and react accordingly.
If your project were to be selected as a Rising Voices grantee, what would be the general timeline of project activities in 2014?
7th May – Confirmation of Funding
13th May – Confirmation of further funding avenues
20th May – Initial Communication with Partners to plan meetings and lay elaborate project plans, Send out applications for Participants to Turkana
27th May – Meetings on Specific dates of Production and Post Production stages
1oth June – Arrival, Meeting with FoLT and selection of Participants
12th June – Field visits for field studies and meeting some of the Film subjects
13th,14th,17th June- Meeting Participants, Introduction to Visual Media for Activism Training
18th, 19th and 21st June – Field days shooting.
24th-27th – Creating of online stories with the participants
1st – 12th July – First 2 Min series edit and Push
14th – 27th July – 2nd Mini series edit and Push
29th July- Launch of 11min Documentary
29th -9th August- Online Push with Participants
17th June
Detail a specific budget of up to $2,500 USD for operating costs.
Workshop Rent – 4 weeks $200
Modems and Internet Access – 4 weeks $300
Audio equipment, Computer (12 desktops, 5 laptops) & Projector Hire – 4 weeks $600
Travel – $600 (Get team to Turkana.) $300 (Transport around Turkana)
Coordination expenses – $50
Translation, Food and Stipends – $ 450
Besides the microgrant funding, what other support can Rising Voices provide for your project to ensure its success?
Rising Voices could help Project Survival Media Kenya and Friends of Lake Turkana network with similar organizations involved in activism and visual media for the dignity and justice of indigenous communities.
Moreover, they could help with the online push of material produced by participants and project partners once the production process starts. Skype calls with the participants would also be hugely motivational.
Contact name
Caroline Wambui Gichobi
Organization
Project Survival Media