AEMS: AEMS Database

Filmed on location in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, Deep Divide explores the reality of environmental justice in South Asia - home to 500 million people living in absolute poverty, or 40% of the world's total poor. Everywhere, it finds environmental injustice.

In Nepal, the holy river Bagmati carries the capital Kathmandu's pollution downstream to shatter the lives and livelihoods of millions of people living downstream. An entire economy is on the brink of collapse -- many rice farmers and fishermen watch helplessly as their once life-giving river has become a river of death.

For three decades, Sri Lanka's coastal areas were developed for tourist resorts and shrimp farms, clearing mangroves, damaging coral reefs and often ignoring governmental guidelines. The cost of this short-sighted development became apparent when the Asian Tsunami hit in December 2004, leaving a trail of destruction.

Water shortages have hit the once idyllic district of Darjeeling in India, forcing local people to go to extremes in search of drinking water. South Asia's stark social and economic disparities are evident here, when the rich continue to enjoy disproportionately large quantities of water in spite of scarcity.

Deep Divide builds on investigations by three local journalists, who act as our guide to understanding the complexities and nuances of development amidst poverty and disparities.