People Fixing the World BBC World Service
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- Health & Fitness
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Brilliant solutions to the world’s problems. We meet people with ideas to make the world a better place and investigate whether they work.
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Redefining luxury fashion
The fashion industry is the third largest manufacturing industry in the world consuming huge amounts of the world’s resources and contributing to greenhouse gas emissions. But some innovators are trying to make the industry more sustainable. We discover how old fire hoses in the UK have been diverted from landfill and turned into fashionable bags and accessories. Plus we visit Mongolia to find out about a new luxury material made from yak hair. It's an eco-friendly replacement for cashmere which comes from goats who are causing desertification. Presenter: Myra Anubi Producer/reporter: Claire Bowes Executive Producer: Richard Kenny Series Producer: Jon Bithrey Editor: Tom Bigwood Sound Mix: Andrew Mills
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How literacy can change a life
Learning to read empowers people, reduces poverty and increases their job chances. Yet more than 700 miliion adults are illiterate, the majority of them women. We look at innovations to help adults learn how to read from flatpack classrooms in flood-prone regions of Bangladesh, to an app teaching tens of thousands in Somaliland. Plus how adults in the UK are improving their reading skills thanks to an army of volunteer teachers using a method developed in prison.
Presenter: Myra Anubi
Reporter/producer: Claire Bates
Series producer: Jon Bithrey
Editor: Tom Bigwood
Sound mix: Andrew Mills
(Image: Jahura Begum, Shabnur Akhter, Rashida Begum at Friendship class in Bangladesh, Friendship) -
The power of music
We all know about the power of music to change our mood or to make us move. But an increasing body of evidence is showing that music has an amazing ability to help us heal. In this programme we are going to meet people working at the cutting edge of music therapy. We find out about the innovative system that uses music to help people with dementia live at home for longer. We will see how using songs and rhythms is helping people with Parkinson’s move more freely. And in a refugee camp in Uganda we meet the teachers using music to bring people together and overcome trauma.
Presenter: Myra Anubi
Producer/Reporter: Richard Kenny
Series Producer: Jon Bithrey
Editor: Richard Vadon
Sound Mix: Frank McWeeny
(Image: Salam Music Program in Bidibidi, Uganda) -
Greener ways to feed the world
Transforming the global food system is vital in the fight against climate change. Currently, food production accounts for a third of all greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, the food system also fails to properly nourish billions of people worldwide.
In this edition of People Fixing The World we’re looking at high and low tech solutions to transform the ways we produce and consume food to make it greener and more equitable.
In London, we visit a startup company making cheese from genetically modified microbes rather than cattle, in a bid to make dairy production better for the planet.
And in Philadelphia we look at how planting fruit and nut trees in ‘food forests’ is tackling hunger by providing access to healthy, nutritious food for low-income communities across the city.
Presenter: Myra Anubi
Reporter/producer: Zoe Gelber
Series producer: Jon Bithrey
Editor: Tom Bigwood
Sound mix: Frank McWeeny -
Magic mushrooms and mental health
Could psychedelic drugs help in the treatment of mental health conditions? We look at pioneering research into psilocybin, the active ingredient in so-called magic mushrooms. We visit a clinic in Oregon, the only state in America where the use of psilocybin in therapeutic sessions is legal and hear from one patient who says it's the only treatment she's ever had that makes a difference to her depression. And we hear about some of the widespread concerns that widening access to such drugs could have.
Presenter: Myra Anubi
Reporter: Ben Wyatt
Series Producer: Jon Bithrey
Editor: Sam Bonham
Sound Mix: Annie Gardiner -
Speaking up at work
Whistleblowers - they're the good guys right? The ones who speak truth to power and have films made about the heroic stands they took? Sometimes. Often the people who speak up in the workplace are ignored or shut down. Worse still they're often bullied or harassed or end up losing their jobs. They're the ones you never hear about.
This week we hear about two projects that are encouraging people to speak up about wrongdoing at work and how they're improving people’s work environment, saving time, money and even saving lives.
Presenter: Myra Anubi
Reporter/producer: Claire Bowes
Series Producer: Jon Bithrey
Editor: Penny Murphy
Sound Mix: Annie Gardiner