NAMUH MEDIA

Client: USAID
Location: Senegal, Tanzania, DRC, Ethiopia

Project Overview: USAID commissioned Namuh to capture stories of their diverse work across the African continent. The photo and video stories were used on their new online immersive storytelling experience as an awareness raising tool to showcase their projects to alleviate extreme poverty around the world.

Challenges: Our first challenge was finding the subjects to focus on for our human interest stories in each country. Beneficiaries are often in remote regions of the country with limited access to communication. We worked with program staff on the ground and the U.S. Embassy in each country to identify the best stories and coordinate the logistics to film them for 2-3 days. In every country our subject spoke a different language so we also had to coordinate translators and transcribers for the interviews. To keep costs down, we combined all the shoots into one 5 week trip with a skeleton crew of 2 people and a bare bones DSLR equipment kit to be nimble as we traveled across the continent. For some shoots we traveled 2-3 days just to get to the recipient and often woke up before dawn to get to their homes before sunrise. Sometimes logistical challenges cut our filming time short and we had to work quickly within much shorter time frames to capture all the footage we needed. When we were filming a survivor of sexual violence in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), we wanted to protect the identity of the girl and her family so we filmed the entire film in a way that the viewer never sees her face or identifying characteristics. That shoot was then interrupted by political violence and we were evacuated from the country.

Outcomes: In the end we produced 5 videos with accompanying photos and written stories. Each one tells the story of a specific challenge and how one person, with the help of USAID, is overcoming this obstacle.

In Senegal, we filmed Hapsatou -- a Community Based Solution Provider who's fighting malnutrition on the border of Senegal and Mauritania by educating her community and training them on better health and hygiene, better farming techniques, vaccinating livestock, and launching small businesses. 

In Democratic Republic of Congo we filmed a young girl who is a survivor of sexual and gender based violence. USAID provided psychosocial, medical, legal, and economic support to her and her family.

In Zanzibar, Tanzania we followed a community health worker who is fighting Malaria with technology and her motorcycle.

In Arusha, Tanzania we filmed Elizabeth at her Masaii boma where solar power is bringing light, hope and new opportunity. 

In Ethiopia, we filmed Dhaka who has formed a milk collective in her community to sell to a local wholesaler.

Awards: The film series won a 2015 Silver Davey Award and USAID's online storytelling experience won 5 Addys for Online Interactive Campaign, Microsite, Interface & Navigation, Responsive Design Entry, and User Experience.

About the Client: USAID is the lead U.S. Government agency that works to end extreme global poverty and enable resilient, democratic societies to realize their potential.