Water for Life Decade >> UN Video library

UN Video library

The video library provides a selection of water-related videos produced by United Nations agencies, programmes and/or initiatives.

Featured videos

Water for Life. Water and Sanitation as a Human Right
UNW-DPAC, December 2011
Duration: 19min09sec
Video on the UN-Water Interview Session at Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum (Bonn, Germany), 20 June 2011. This session was organized by the United Nations Office to Support the International Decade for Action "Water for Life" 2005-2015/UN-Water Decade Program on Advocacy and Communication (UNW-DPAC), in collaboration with UN-Habitat, the UN-Water Decade Program on Capacity Building (UNW-DPC) and the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC). During the session, the panel and the audience discussed about the UN resolution, the aspect of sanitation, the country example of South Africa and experiences and opinions from the audience.

Bangladesh: Traces of Poison in Water
UN in Action, December 2011
Place: Bangladesh
Duration: 6min48sec
In 1993, Bangladesh found its main source of fresh water tainted with naturally occurring arsenic posing a public health risk to millions. Since then, the country has partnered with the World Bank and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to introduce isotope hydrology techniques to locate safe sources of water.

Kenya: Water Scarcity
UN in Action, November 2011
Place: Kenya
Duration: 3min48sec
In Kenya, the International Atomic Energy Agency is helping farmers make the most of limited water resources. Innovative irrigation and nuclear techniques enable communities to grow stronger crops while protecting the environment.

Ethiopia: Drought Lingers
UN in Action, October 2011
Place: Ethiopia
Duration: 3min56sec
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) recently trained pastoralists in Ethiopia to watch for warning signs of drought. Some 12 million pastoralists here travel great distance to find grazing land and water sources for their livestock daily. IFAD is counting on its investment in training to avert any future humanitarian crisis like the one unfolding now in the Horn of Africa.

Mauritania: Oasis Farmers
UN in Action, September 2011
Place: Mauritania
Duration: 3min15sec
Severe drought and desertification in Mauritania has forced many villagers to abandon their traditions and move to cities. A new project financed by the International Fund for Agricultural Development is helping find local solutions with the assistance of farmers from nearby Morocco.

Dam Safety in Central Asia
UN in Action, September 2011
Place: Central Asia
Duration: 4min24sec
Aging dams are a potential threat to millions living in flood-prone urban areas in Central Asia. A special project, supported by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, is underway to improve monitoring and maintenance of the Soviet-era dams.

Africa's Lake Victoria: Turning the Tide
UNTV 21st Century, 2011
Place: Lake Victoria
Duration: 6min48sec
The struggle to access clean water and basic sanitation is intensifying as the global population ratchets up by the billion. Overcrowded makeshift settlements are springing up along the world's lakes and seas at a staggering pace, putting the health of millions under threat. This video takes you to Africa's Lake Victoria where one community is turning the tide on this alarming trend.

Water in Cities
UNESCO's International Hydrological Programme, 2011
Duration: 5min56sec
This short film aims to illustrate present and future challenges in urban water management, highlighting water problems facing cities around the world. As water has become an increasingly crucial issue facing many cities around the world today, film is designed to promote sustainable and innovative approaches that UNESCO is pursuing to help countries address water problems in fast-growing cities, and to assist cities to develop strategies for sustainable urban water management.

India's Iceman
UNTV 21st Century, 2011
Place: India
Duration: 8min52sec
Climate change is threatening the future of millions of people. But high up in the Himalayas, a man known as The Ice Man, is trying to do what nature no longer can - and give his community a chance of survival – by building artificial glaciers.

Morocco's solution to water scarcity
FAO, June 2011
Place: Morocco
Duration: 3min30sec
Change is on the way for Morocco's approach to irrigation. Thanks to an FAO development project that brings together local farmers into water user groups, drip irrigation (letting water drip slowly to the roots of plants by means of a network of valves, pipes and emitters) is widespreading throughout the country. This means increasing yeld from crops, enhancing training programs to assist the transition, and less field work for women too.

Turning the tide on desertification in Africa
FAO, 2011
Place: Senegal
Duration: 3min27sec
In Senegal, the Acacia project has involved the planting and managing of Acacia forests in arid lands helping combat desertification while providing life-changing benefits to local communities. With two thirds of the African continent now classified as desert or drylands and desertification affecting a quarter of the world's population, the breakthrough has the potential to transform the lives of vulnerable populations.

Brazil Drylands: The Promise of Water
UNTV 21st Century, April 2011
Place: Brazil
Duration: 4min40sec
Desertification threatens almost half of the world's land. If left unchecked, its effects are disastrous. But in the drylands of Brazil, new hope is emerging: a project is educating farmers on a number of low cost time-proven methods of land cultivation and thus preventing desertification.

The Man Who Stopped the Desert
UNTV, 2011
Place: Burkina Faso
Duration: 1min
The story of Yacouba Sawadogo, an illiterate farmer from Burkina Faso, who managed to win the battle against the on-going desertification of the region. This is the clip of the winner of Special Jury Award in the International Forest Film Festival.

Colombia: Wayuu "Gold"
UNTV 21st Century, 2011
Place: Colombia
Duration: 8min46sec
Desert conditions have been exacerbated in recent years in Northern Colombia. The indigenous Wayuu women are struggling to ensure their community's very survival despite dwindling water resources. This video shows the initiatives they have taken to improve the situation.

Argentina: Dreaming of a Clean River
UNTV 21st Century, 2011
Place: Argentina
Duration: 6min27sec
One of the world's most polluted rivers flows through Argentina's capital Buenos Aires and threatens the health of the city's poorest people. Now, one determined nine-year-old girl and her tenacious mother have decided enough is enough.