TVE International.
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All over the world, green enterprise is growing. This program focuses on the catalyst that is transforming Earth-friendly businesses into paying ventures: a thing that economists call externalities. In Mexico, coffee growers use collective bargaining to create a more secure market. In Tanzania, where malaria is rampant, a mosquito net manufacturer makes good by marketing social change. In Brazil, babassu nut farmers preserve their traditional business...
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The UN Environment Program has identified approximately 150 dead zones in the Earth's seas-some more than 40,000 square miles in size. Examining causes ranging from too many partially cremated bodies in the Ganges to defunct sewage systems in Nairobi, this program explains how watercourses flowing into the seas are being polluted and coastal areas are being destroyed. The catastrophic effects on marine habitats as well as on the health and livelihoods...
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In the Kolli Hills of India, hardy, nutritious millet has been reintroduced to the farming community as a sustainable alternative to the short-term benefits of cash crops. And in Italy, a "food archaeologist" searches for long-lost varieties of fruit, aiming to promote biodiversity by breeding commercially viable strains. This program visits the people and places involved with agro-ecology projects, making the point that 75 percent of traditional...
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The intention behind the Indonesian Mega Rice Project was a good one: by demolishing millions of acres of peat swamp forest, land could be cleared to cultivate much-needed grain. But the project unleashed a cascade of interlocking social and ecological catastrophes - a situation considered to be one of the worst environmental disasters on the planet. This program follows the efforts of agronomist Suwido Limin to protect his peat swamp forest research...
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Patterns of urbanization and poverty are playing an increasingly heavy role in the debate over globalization and market regulation. In a hard-hitting analysis of the issues, this program assembles a wide-ranging set of opinions from scholars and experts-as well as from ordinary individuals around the world who face urban hardships and obstacles to their livelihoods every day. Commentators include economists Jeffrey Sachs and 2008 Nobel Laureate Paul...
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The biosphere reserve coordinator in North Devon, England, wants people to know that a biosphere is not an arcane experiment conducted under a dome, but a living lab where environmental changes are studied with the goal of resolving conflicts between humans and nature. This program looks at the economic realities of two distinct populations that share similar ecological problems by visiting biospheres in the U.K., where shore areas are threatened...
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Are the days of the traditional cash economy numbered? This program examines ground-breaking monetary systems designed to benefit disadvantaged segments of the population and build strength in the small business sector-not only in the United States, but also in Mexico, India, Poland, and Britain. Traveling to each country, the program showcases remarkable financial innovations-including the "Ithaca hour," a currency rapidly becoming standard in the...
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As corporations continue to think globally, the rapidly deteriorating state of the environment is demanding that they act locally-now. This program brings together the president of the World Bank and visionary corporate leaders to map out a plan for a sustainable future that everyone can live with. British Petroleum, an industry giant committed to reducing greenhouse gases; the Otto Group, a German conglomerate that factors environmental protection...
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Earth's temperature is on the rise-and so are incidents of severe weather and heat-related health problems. This program travels the world to observe how global warming, accelerated and exacerbated by air pollution, is affecting society. Coastal erosion in Florida, the destruction of Alaskan forests by the spruce beetle, the depletion of Montana's glaciers, the decline in North Pacific salmon, rising sea levels that threaten to engulf the world's...
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During the annual rainy season in Saint-Louis, one of Senegal's largest cities, thousands of people face upheaval from flood devastation linked to rising sea levels. There are no funds to build a cement sea wall, so the city dumps garbage along its waterfront in an attempt to shield itself. As mayor, Cheikh Bamba Dieye took on the responsibility of protecting his constituents from flooding, but with a severe lack of financial and infrastructural resources,...
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Often thought of as the Amazon of Southeast Asia, the mighty Mekong River flows through six nations and is central to the livelihoods of some 60 million people. In Laos, plans have been drawn up for 11 hydroelectric dams along the river, with the government agreeing to sell 95 percent of the electricity to neighboring Thailand. The envisioned construction projects and energy-centered commerce would create an unprecedented level of economic activity...
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The Donana marshland. The oyster beds below Rio. The Caspian's sturgeon fishing grounds. The coral reefs of the South Pacific. This program travels to Spain, Brazil, Iran, and Fiji to observe efforts to mitigate severe ecological damage to these sensitive regions-places primarily spoiled by water pollution, with causes as varied as upland agricultural runoff and the rupture of a mine tailings dam. Solutions such as preservation legislation, riverbank...
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Competition for freshwater is heating up. Is war inevitable, or is a peaceful solution possible? This program spotlights three trouble spots that epitomize the intensifying crisis and efforts being made to manage it: the Okavango, where a commission formed by Angola, Namibia, and Botswana is trying to resolve the conflict that is endangering the river's unspoiled waters; the Rio Grande, where an aging water-sharing treaty and ever-greater demands...
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Access to affordable, sustainable energy supplies is a growing concern around the world. This program looks at successful enterprises that are providing some renewable energy solutions. In Scotland, small-scale turbines put wind power within the reach of domestic users. In Sweden, the world's first train to be run solely on biogas has been developed. In Nepal, biogas stoves are improving the quality of life in many ways. And in India, agricultural...
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The Sahel has long been prone to cycles of drought, but those of the 20th century were especially severe, devastating the land and the lives of the people living there. This program spotlights the efforts of aid agency director Mathieu Ouedraogo to regreen the territory by teaching farmers in Burkina Faso traditional conservation methods. The result? "It's like a miracle," he says of an anti-flooding technique successfully employed by the villagers....
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Since the Industrial Revolution sparked the widespread burning of fossil fuels, scientists have concerned themselves with the climatic effects of carbon dioxide. This program spotlights milestones in the history of that research as it seeks to understand humankind's impact on Earth's atmosphere. The greenhouse effect, global warming, ozone depletion, the Keeling Curve, the Atlantic Conveyor Theory, and other key concepts are illustrated through the...
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After direct habitat destruction, nonnative species introduced by humans to new areas pose the largest threat to global biodiversity. This program looks at how scientists and conservationists are coping with a number of these critical situations, such as on Seychelles, where rats have caused 200 years of devastation; on Scotland's Outer Hebrides, where hedgehogs were released to control garden slugs; and in New York City, where Asian longhorn beetles...