Ten short documentaries that illustrate the flaws of South Africa’s food system, exposed through the COVID-19 pandemic. Available for download and screening.
Produced by the Human Rights Media Trust, these ten short documentary films raise critical questions about our food system:
- Do we continue with business as usual when we can see it is not working. The current system of food production based on big profit driven agriculture, has contributed to hunger, a decrease in the nutritional value of food that is available and affordable to large sections of the population.
- If we prioritise a new, people-centred model of placing food distribution around rights and needs, health and wellbeing, what would that look like? We explore the initiatives that could be scaled up and scaled deep and ask, ‘what would this take’?
- What lessons can we learn from people’s collective attempts to bridge the hunger gap?
- What role has the government played in exacerbating the food crisis? What role would a responsible government play in supporting food as a public right? What policies need to be put in place? And what is the moral obligation to do this, as set out in the South Africa Constitution.
Intended to open up debate, the ten episodes are free for screening and download. Please make use of them!
Episode 3: Surviving Lockdown
During the first months of Covid-19 restrictions, informal traders were banned from trading by the National Coronavirus Command Council. We follow two women street traders, and learn of the disastrous implications of lockdown on their ability to make a living. The ban also affected the lives of essential workers, including health care workers, who could not easily access healthy cooked meals at a time when they were under the most pressure.
Episode 2: Cape Town Together
We follow the initial phases of the Community Action Networks (CANs) in Cape Town, the rationale behind bottom up organising during the early stages of the pandemic, and some of the challenges faced at community level by the CANs, a movement that was then replicated in Gauteng, the Eastern Cape and Mpumalanga.
The Food Series Episode 1: Feeding 5000
At the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, food security quickly became as much an issue as health education in Eldorado Park. The film shows how deep rooted community activists came together with local councillors, put aside political differences and organised mutual aid for the people.
