Filming for UN REDD+ in the streets of Kinshasa with Breakthrough Media

I’m now officially on holiday in Kinshasa, Congo’s capital city; it’s quite a contrast to the isolated rainforest setting of Basankusu. The city is alive with building sites as investors take advantage of the established peace following years of war.

A view of Kinshasa's Boulevard 30 June with lots of building going on

I was able to meet up with three of our students at the Procure Saint Anne. This is the best known place to stay in Kinshasa for Catholic personnel – as well as, these days, people from humanitarian and development organisations. The three students have finished two years in Kenya and Uganda and have been with us in Basankusu for a holiday. They’re on their way back to Uganda to complete their Philosophy course.

Mill Hill Missionaries students relax in Kinshasa before returning to their studies in Uganda

A week after they went, my own Basankusu Mill Hill Missionary students arrived. They made a similar journey to me from Basankusu. The difference is that they’d never been out of Basankusu before – so everything is new and exciting to them. They’ve applied for their passports and vaccinations so that they can begin their year of initial training in Kenya before entering the seminary in Uganda.

Mlle Marie-Clemence guides the new students through their passport application

In the grounds of Procure St. Anne, Kinshasa

In Kinshasa with Sam filming charcoal sellers

Anyway, to say that I’m on holiday is not strictly true. Before I re-joined Mill Hill Missionaries last year, I did work in Kinshasa as part of an organisation which deals with environmental issues and village communities. It deals with how people use the country’s natural resources and protects the rights of communities so that they benefit when the government or businesses move into their communities. It’s headed by the national television journalist, Nene Mainzana, and is called the Centre for Innovative Technology and Sustainable Development (CTIDD) [acronym is in French]. It brings together the emerging wave of agricultural engineers, GPS map-makers, environmental experts and journalists. Although we are all volunteers, projects get done when outside agencies – like the United Nations, USaid, WWF, or Oxfam, etc fund our group of experts to carry out the project in the field, here in the Congo.

Sam Sapin fim-maker (Breakthrough Media) interviewing an old lady who sells charcoal to make ends meet

We were very pleased when London based Breakthrough Media asked us to be the “fixers” for their United Nations sponsored project. The film is being made in five African countries, with the Congo part being about a sustainable charcoal project. Kinshasa is notorious for its frequent power-cuts during which people resort to cooking outside on little charcoal stoves. Unfortunately, this means cutting down a lot of trees. But, trees are a crop and can be re-planted. The film looks at the organisation of a large community a few hours’ drive from Kinshasa where the local people have been given land to grow crops and at the same time plant and manage the trees in a new forest. In only a few years, their new forest, on land which was infertile savannah, has produced thousands of trees worth $1,000 US each.

Meeting Sam Sapin at the Beatrice Hotel, Kinshasa

We collected Breakthrough Media’s film-maker, Sam Sapin from Kinshasa’s new airport terminal on Tuesday. We’d arranged interviews with government ministers and people involved in the charcoal project for Wednesday. Thursday we hit the streets of Kinshasa to see where the charcoal get sold. We met some great characters and also met with the realities of life in a society without a social services or free education or health system.

Sam was keen to film Kinshasa life from every angle and didn’t want to waste a minute of daylight. Before speeding off with fixer Nene over the rough dirt tracks of Bandundu Province to see the project in action, he even got his beard trimmed by a pavement barber!