anchor: hello and welcome to global3000. can aid workers trying to help those worse off in far-away countries actually become part of the problem? that's just one of the questions we'll be exploring on today's programme. here's what we have coming up -- slum tours, is it all right to make money with trips into urban ghettos? shifting hardware, we look at how dubai has become a hub for global aid. and how taking local fisherman on board could help biodiversity in mexico.

how would you like to spend your next holiday in an african township? or take a tour through a slum in latin america? doesn't sound relaxing. "slumming" dates back to the 1880s, when the upper classes of london and new york liked to poer dtricts.ial divide into but when does interest turn to voyeurism? nowadays, many tours are organized by those who live in slums to help finance projects and improve the lives of the people who live there. so they deserve support, right? we took two of these tours, the first in a favela in rio de janeiro. reporter: they're off on a new adventure. everyone in this tour group has already seen sugarloaf and the statue of christ. today they are visiting one of rio de janeiro's favelas. the excursion costs 40 euros

apiece. richard: i chose to travel on a tour of this nature just for safety's sake. and i'm expecting to see extreme poverty, but i think that there is beauty in everything. eileen: i wouldn't be surprised if they had mobile phones and scooters and that sort of thing. as it said in the press, it is a city within a city. reporter: they soon see the first buildings in rocinha. the shanty town extends all the way up the hill. richard: wow, quite amazing actually. you've got such a poor society living so close to a rich. its well worth a visit. i can't wait to walk it. reporter: tour guide marcos lelal leads the group into the heart of rocinha and one of the numerous shopping streets. eileen gerard from britain says not much here reminds her of a slum. eileen: i think the people are so resourceful, that they all find a living out of very, very poor conditions. and i mean it's like a very thriving busy town - which is poverty, but it's very, very

busy. they're all working hard. it's amazing. reporter: just a few years ago, taking pictures here would have been life-threatening. armed drug dealers ruled the streets. now, for the past two and a half years the favela has been peaceful. the locals have got used to large numbers of tourists here. >> i think we're privileged to have them look at our favela. >> they have the opportunity to see a favela from the inside - how it looks, how things run. more than anything they see that marvellous people live here. reporter: the most popular holiday snap motif and a permanent feature of the tour, is the view from the very top. richard: it's like a patchwork quilt all connected. marcos: and in rio we were more than 1000 slums. and you have since today some place that the police don't go. it is a difficult society to

balance. ok? eileen: is there a solution, is there a plan to help to change things, to help all the people with sewage and -- marcos: sometimes we ask it, but they don't have the plans because the state now is broken. so managing the situation is very difficult. ok? reporter: the complex social problems can only be touched on. that's all the tourists want. many people live here illegally and are the poorest of the poor. after an hour and a half, their introduction tour is over. eileen: i do, i just admire them very much. and i'm glad i don't have to live there. as jan said, we are very, very privileged to be here and visit.

reporter: they now plan to recommend the favela tour to friends back home. mumbai has one of the largest slums in asia, dharavi. steve: my name is steve salvan and i'm from london. we've stopped through mumbai for a couple of nights. and from reading the reviews, the people have said that in a lot of cases it was the most exciting and the most interesting thing they'd done whilst they were here. so we decided to give it a go. reporter: faizan farooqi is their guide today. more than 750,000 people live and work in dharavi. no one knows the exact number. faizan: even my mother, if she has enough glass or plastic, she keeps on collecting it and then she sells it or she exchanges it with garlic.

by doing this tour we try to expel the negative image of dharavi. we were born here in dharavi. so this is the place where we belong. and it's safe. and at the same time the company provides us part-time jobs so that we can study as well as we can look after the family. reporter: faizan earns a living by doing this job. he's studying to be a pharmacist. the slum-dwellers are proud of where they live. this shop owner plans to sell his bags under the brand name dharavi.

mohammad: the tours are good for us. there are many slums in the world, but dharavi is unique because so many products are made here, so many people work here in so many different kinds of business, i don't think there's a slum comparable to dharavi in that sense. >> the annual turnover in dharavi is an estimated 600 million euros a year. the "be the local" tours started back in 2010. faizan and his co-workers are all students. his dream is to have his own pharmacy in dharavi one day. steve and lisa try an indian snack and, of course, freshly brewed tea. steve: i think for me, i really liked seeing the way that they were recycling plastic. and i think that was because i can see people doing that at home, and how people are throwing stuff away, just treating it as rubbish. and here people have getting

that, you can see the difference, little parts of the industry, the process. >> so how was the tour? did you enjoy it? >> yeah. it was fantastic. we loved it. thank you very much. if you liked the tour, then share it with your friends and families... reporter: faizan also hopes they'll publicise it on the internet, where lisa first discovered it. interest is growing in trips like this, an experience that didn't even exist a few years ago. anchor: when disaster strikes anywhere in the world, the aid machinery at big global agencies springs into action. water treatment facilities, tents, blankets, medication much of what is needed in an acute crisis passes through dubai. it's one of the biggest global air transport hubs. to be efficient, humanitarian aid agencies have to take their cue from the business, and work

according to its rules. but can market forces really dictate the business of helping those in need? we went to the persian gulf to find out. reporter: humanitarian aid is profitable, even for these migrant labourers -- sudanese contract workers in dubai are sorting through the packaging waste that suddenly accumulates when a disaster like the one in nepal strikes. we're in the world's biggest aid relief complex, 50 kilometres outside dubai, storage facilities as far as the eye can see. and inside, there are cartons as far as the eye can see. the head of logistics at the un's world food programme says supplies often have to be repacked. stefano: this is a donation from

the japanese government. they have procured it from a company in the market. reporter: in an emergency, products from countless deliveries have to be packed together. a look at this showroom indicates how diverse the items are. from tents to saucepans to toys -- aid workers speak of survival kits. ideally, families in need get relief of this standard. disasters become sales outlets. stefano: in 2014/15 we had what we call an l3 emergency, which is a corporate emergency where there is a huge caseload beneficiaries to be served. and we have 5 of them at the same time. so of course, the response of this big five emergencies create an opportunitiy for whoever is, in our case, dealing with a big food commodity or logistic services or any file like the one we see in the unhrd. reporter: 28 aid agencies and the united nations have depots

here, both free of cost and duty-free. everything comes together in the offices of the un world food programme. the man behind it all is the sheik of dubai. he's created a mega-hub of the global humanitarian aid programme at a cost of 80 million euros. the control centre of international humanitarian city, far from the cartons and depots. anyone wanting to do business with the humanitarian aid scene has to come here. the top managers of large companies come and go freely - like the head of ups india. his company has just donated another cargo flight to kathmandu. the partnership is close. the returns, he stresses, are indirect. rami: indirect return - obviously, as you build capabilities, as you deal with crisis such as nepal, which has been one of the more difficult crisis situations to deal with, you can lever some of these skills on the commercial side to provide aid and provide support.

reporter: but the returns aren't quite that indirect. most of the time, providing services, whether for emergencies or long-term aid - also means profits. pre-fab housing, tents, office equipment, all those items are usually bought with money from donations. shipping them to their destinations also means business for private companies. and being seen in the flattering light of aid providers is great for their images. stefano: most of them, the corporate social responsibility is one of the things driving them to be present, to be next to us, not only on the commercial point of view but also from a moral or more ethical point of view, giving something back to the country where they might have already operation. if you think of the bigger logistic corporations today, they are present worldwide.

so they have the interest also to show the community that are affected by disasters that they are doing not only money but also that they areready to help with that. reporter: stefano peveri is uneasy these days. stefano: where is this going? to the palestinians reporter: after the himalayan earthquakes, some of the un depots look as if they'd been looted. nepal has been a drain on supplies. more are on the way, but when will they arrive? aid is still needed in yemen, the large refugee camps in jordan and kenya, and areas affected by ebola. it's hard to put a price on humanitarian aid. stefano: if you need 15 tons fork lifts to be procured in the market is going to take you probably between 30 to 40 weeks. and we could get in nepal thanks to this kind of partnership in 3 days.

so it's difficult to put a price or a value to that. it's just thanks to them that they are there to support. reporter: the migrant labourers are working for union paper mills, the largest paper mill in the united arab emirates. it's just one of a growing number of dubai-based companies that are profiting from the world's disasters. anchor: so no denying that helping is a business, too. speaking of that- ever hear of an aid agency that is mostly busy with administering itself? that looks down on the people it's supposed to help? full of "international staff" plotting their next career move by making sure the head office in some western capital is happy? meet the samaritans from a new comedy series on the air in kenya. the biting satire helps make it clear why many africans say ngo actually stands for 'nothing going on'.

>> i'm down to my last. once i smoked my last i need something to smoke. reporter: the film is about dead rhinos and office intrigues in short, an ngo that does nothing. the samaritans are nothing if not politically incorrect, and their name speaks volumes: aid for aid. the low budget satire was shot in nairobi. young kenyan filmmakers wanted to deliver a product that could make the grade on the international market, with an international topic. so the samaritans embody every stereotype associated with a bloated, ineffectual and complacent aid industry. >> hi, i'm scott bartley. and i'm an alcoholic -- ooh, wrong meeting. hussein: you have shows about doctors and lawyers and food and

chefs, but never about the aid worker population, and they're everywhere, everybody in every community in every country. reporter: hussein kurji wrote the screenplay and salim keshavjee directed. they've made two pilot films. and now they're showing them in the lion's den: the un headquarters in nairobi. salim: they showed us a photograph. they said, 'uh, there's going to be like 20, 30 people coming by.' but i think it's going to be more. reporter: lunch break at the united nations. the auditorium fills up. whether from the un's food and agricultural organisation or its environment program, they're all here to see themselves as others see them. some aren't feeling especially comfortable. >> we hadn't made a start on the grant application. we didn't even have a good acronym yet. and everybody knows it's all about the acronym. sometimes a good acronym can win a grant just like that! reporter: ngo-speak: talking a lot to say nothing. the more recognisable it becomes, the more the professional aid workers relax.

>> so everyone's going to take four letters. i'm thinking beef, boeuf, zone something catchy, pizzazz, yeah. >> 'building real infrastructure, bringing enterprise to societies which is bribes, but that didn't help anyone. that was complete nonsense. >> it raises questions that are interesting. and the focus that the clients of the ngo are often the donors, not the beneficiaries. and the effort, it's mostly done to please the donors, not the beneficiaries. it's quite real. >> personally, i haven't experienced, but these are things we hear all the time. >> we have to be able to laugh at ourselves, and some of the excesses and abuses that might exist in some of the ngo community.

salim: most ngos say they know someone in another ngo that's exactly like one of the characters or who have been in one of those situations. hussein: most ngos like the fact that there's a comedy piece about them, because there's not a lot of content that surrounds the ngo. i think this is the first one, or the very first. reporter: and ironically, it received 20,000 euros in funding from an ngo. right now the filmmakers are looking for a producer so they can shoot and broadcast the planned total of 13 episodes. they say it's time someone spoke some home truths. salim: it's still a platform to speak about other truths about nepotism, about favouritism, about unequal pay, about homosexuality, about racism. in we can bring up a lot of social topics through the format of humour, through the genre. reporter: they say they're artists, not activists, and they want to entertain. so dear ngos, don't get upset. it's all in fun. >> be out of here by three. hashtag, home time.

don't tweet that! >> we mustn't lose sight of what is important here. >> saving africa? anchor: we wrap up our journey on today's global 3000 from a location that is home to a vast range of sea life, including about a quarter of all known marine mammal species. parts of the gulf of california on the west coast of mexico are a unesco world heritage site, including the isla isabel. here bioligists are asking local fishermen for help in perserving the dwindling biodiversity. reporter: it is five in the morning. we are a few kilometres off isla isabel in the gulf of california. marine biologist jacques cousteau once called the region "the world's aquarium."

feliciano: we depend on the island, my wife, my son and i, my whole family. it's a cornucopia, this island. there's good and bad, just like in real life. but we live with it, so we have to protect it. reporter: the fishermen come him!!!! from the mainland, more kilometres away. sometimes they spend the night on the island. feliciano: because of commercial trawling, and, of course, our small boats, fishing is getting more difficult. we used to have two or three nets. now we bring along five. reporter: the island is of volcanic origin. it's been an official nature reserve for fifteen years.

its biodiversity is known far beyond mexico's borders. tens of thousands of marine birds live here, on a single square kilometer. researchers from the german sustainable development organisation, giz, together with mexico's national park authority, now want to protect the waters around the island as well. jorge: there's a wealth of fish species from the entire region here. that's because currents from the gulf of california and the tropical current from costa rica and other countries arrive here. that's unique for the development of biodiversity. reporter: and that's no longer intact here. the marine biologists would like to ban fishing completely in the island's immediate vicinity.

they recently created artificial reefs to attract more species. a dive will now ascertain whether it's been worth it. amilcar: i'm very happy with what i've seen. it's developing well. there are new algae, many more different fish than in the neighbouring zone in which there's only sand. so we've achieved our aim. reporter: suddenly, a whale shark swims up close. the waters around the island are important feeding grounds for it. and the shark itself is an exciting object for the scientists.

jorge: of course there are whale sharks in some parts of mexico. you can observe them across from nayarit. we've seen these already. we've recognised them, in the bahia de los angeles, for instance, because of their distinctive markings. they've migrated here. we don't know much about these migrations, but we're observing them now to find out more. reporter: the birds have no natural enemies, so they're quite trusting towards the few people who come here. boobies and frigate birds raise their young here. they find food both on the island itself and in the waters off its shores. the director of the national park has been fighting for years to keep the commercial fishing industry away from isla isabel.

>> protecting the island alone isn't anough. we also have to protect the marine region around it so life can continue on the island. we have to maintain fish stocks so the birds can continue to feed on them. but of course the fishermen should be able to have enough and improve their catch. reporter: the scientists are cooperating closely with the local fishermen, who are now also convinced that the island's immediate surroundings should be protected. >> i think our motivation has to be to protect fishing here for the next generation. my son is already asking me if he can be a fisherman, too. if one of us has to go, we all have to.

reporter: and if the birds can no longer to find food here, they, too, will one day be gone. anchor: amazing images and there are plenty more online. if you would like to learn more about the isla isabel or to take part in our global debate, then you can find us on twitter -- that's @dw_globalideas. or head for our website. we'll be back here for you in seven days' time. until then from me and the whole team here in our global studio thanks for watching and bye bye! [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

did you know that over 50% of most people's water bill is for watering their lawn and garden! and remember - you can reduce your water bills by collecting rainwater - simply catching the rain that down through your gutters anyway - and storing it in any kind of tank you like. when you need to water your

plants, you've got free irrigation water through a hose at the base of your tank now that makes sense.

>> memphis, tennessee. it has been written is music were religion, then memphis would be jerusalem and sun studio its most sacred shrine. and you are here with... the features. >> memphis means music and the spirit of sun studio lives at the memphis music foundation in our one-of-a-kind music resource center. this nonprofit is committed to helping artists succeed in their music careers.