narrator: today on "earth focus," religion and development t in asia. filmmakers kalyanee mam and gary marcuse on how cultural traditions intersect with economic growth in cambodia and china.

coming up on "earth focus." kalyanee: as an immigrant, as a refugee, you know, from cambodia, my family and i, you know, fled cambodia when i was four years old. and what i realized was what happening in areng valley was that the people were also being threatened b by the same kinindf displacement and uprootedness. and what i've seen with the chong people is that they live a very beautiful life, coleletely connected to nanatur, and i was inspired to make this film to help people understand, you knowow, how important that connection is.

[baby fusses] kalyanee: so the chong people have been living in areng valley, you know, for over 600 years.

and we went back to cambodia to film and i discovered, you know, two of the most amazing people i've ever met in my life. and what i discovered was that they are probablbly one of t the most rooted and grounded people i've ever met, andnd the reason is because of f their connectitn to the land. you know, , they feel l so gratl for natuture becausese everythig they havave comes from nature.e. the cambodian government has contracted a chinese company to build this dam, and the company's name is sino hydro, and, you know, we've all been asking questions. why is sino hydro intererested in proceeding with this dam when two other companies have already, you know, previously pulled o out of the e project?

because they discovered through environmental impact assessment reports that they had conducted themselves that the dam was not economically viable. and i ththk one of t the reasons is that they will make money from the contract t from constructing this dam, and alsoo the dam will be built on a build transfer agreement. and according to the agreement, the dam will be transferred to the cambodian government after 40 years time. during that transfer, the dam will already have built up so much sediment and silt, the cambodian government would actually inherit a dam that'ss no longer functioning in its propeper place. so i think that the answer for me is they want to access this place for the logging, for the mining, you know, for the minerals that they can find. so most of the money will be made during this period beforere the construction of the dam even takes place.

when your land is threatened and your home is threatened, i i don't think there's any choice, you know. there'e's no choice in the mattr about,t, oh, do i fight for my land or do i just stay silent? [chanting]

kakalyanee: bubuddhism camame fm the land, came from the trees and the laland and thehe water. and acactually, the buddddhist monks have been really active, you know, fofor the last few years in areng valley and also withth other prorotests thatat e been happening all across the country. they feel that they are not just there to be religious figures, but they are there to actively be involved in fighting and helping the communities fight and protesest for r what they think is right and d just.

kalyanee: the wrapping of the trees, it's both symbolic and also practical. it's symbolic because, you know, the saffron robe is a symbol of the monkhood and is also a symbol of this affinity and connection with the trees. but it's also practical because

if loggers come and they see the saffron robe, you know, wrapped around the tree, they might think twice, you know, about cutting that tree down. kakalyanee: this i is about, you know, what we want to pass on to our grandchihildrn and to thehe future. do we want to pass on a desolate desert or do we want to pass on a h heritage that is loviving of the e earth, youou ,

loving of the land, loving of nature, and is giving, you know, to one another?

fred de sam lazaro: in downtown beijing on the 20th floor of a high-rise, one of china's senior environmental reporters is becoming a buddhist. [doorbell rings] liu jianqiang: hi. fred: hi. liu: fred? hi. fred: good to meet you. liu: nice to see you. fred: likewise. liu jianqiang is an

investigative journalist. his first story about the environment was an exposé about illegal dam construction on the upper yangtze river. it made national headlines. his hard-hitting stories eventually got him fired, so he continued his work as the beijing editor of china dialogue, an online international journal. [liu speaking chinese] fred: but after 10 years o of reporting, he was feeling burneded out. [liu speaking chinese] translator: i think that our environmental activists and those who work for public welfare need more powerful spiritual support. whwhy? every day what we do may be good deeds which give u us posititive energy, butut meanwhe what we are facing is ththe darkest side of the world. every day what we see is polluted air, polluted rivers, and the slaughter of wild

animals. this kind of negativive energy attacks us all t the time. we've been working on environmental protection for a long time, but the situation in china is getting worse every day. where do we draw our strengthh from? fred: liu jijianqiang is one of millionsns of chchinese whwho ae returning to buddhist, taoist, and confucian temples that were ononce condemned by the government. a little more than four decades ago during chihina's cultural revolutition, many bududdhist temples like this one in central beijing were destroyed or defaced. today these temples are alive with worshipers. by some accounts, one out of every five chinese, 240 million people call themselves buddhist. some scholars say this search for faith is linked to china's massive environmental problems. gary marcuse: i had been filming in china since 2008, when i i first started t to meet someme of the kind of leading enviroroental actitivists and journalists inin china.

when my friend liu jianqiang said he's becoming a buddhist, particularly a tibetan buddhist, i was very curious about why. we'd already decided we would make a little dodocumentary that would sort of show people what it is that has attracted him, but when i asked himim just in shorthand, you know, what is it that you're looking for in a religion, in a faith, in a culture? and he said, well, you know, for 15 years, hehe said, i''ve n reporting on the environment, and in that time, everything is still getting worse. so you begin to feel like what's the point? you knowow, we're exhausted, we're burned out. and he s said i neneeded somethg more endururing, something for the longer term,m, something tht would allow me to have a little bit more faith in my own work. well, i asked liu jianqiang, how would we show people what it is about the tibetans that really appeal to you? and he said, well, you should just go talk to one ofof the tibebetan monks, thehe kind of person that i met alall the meme up there. so, you know, go into the mountains and meet some of the

people and listen to the way that they talk about nature, and you'll see what it was ththat really, you know, apppped toto me. fred: today this lake is the scene of annual l gatherings of buddhist monks. it's also the site of a special meeting between buddhists and scientists. dr. lu zhi is a conservation biologist at peking university. she's been working with tibetans in this area for many years. translator: during the 1990s, when i went to the tibetan area for the first time, i saw something that r really surprised me. ththere was a lot of loggiging going g on, but in some areaeas, the wild aninimals were not afraid of people. and there were very old trees,

600 or 700 y years old. the ancient forest wasas preserved. i asked the locacal people how is this popossible? people said this i is our sacred mountain. this was a big shock to me. just the concept of sacred mountain was good enough to preserve the resources. it's more powerful than the law or the preaching of scientists. totoday the systemem is still functioning. in the core area, nothing should be touched. then in a broader area, killing is notot allowed. no living bebeings should be haharmed. we did a survey on birds, and we discovered that wherever the belief in sacred mountains is strong, there is greater bibiodiversity. so this shows scscientifically

ththe enviroronmental vavalue s sacred momountain fred: ththen for two years, dr. lu and her students used gps to map the sacred mountains in the ganzi district of western sichuan province. they found an average of three sacred mountains near each monastery in the district. in the united states, the protected area would be about the size of vermont and new hampshire combined. nearly one third of the land is in sacred areas. translator: who will protect the envivironment in the westt and in c china? it is governrnment respsponsibibilities. but the titibetans don't ink k f it that way. if you think of it that way, you are not buddhist. you are the protector. no matter if you are a newborn or 80 years old, you arere all protector. you have r responsnsibilities.

all lives should be protected. fred: in some e districts, local gogovernments are recognizizinge sacreded mountains, and some a e en hiring tibetans to take care of the national nature reserves. translator: the cultural values of buddhism are very comforting to the scholars of conservation. i felt at last we found a way, and i began toto gain confidence in humananity. these tibetan pele are not wealthy, yet they can ststill think of other creatures. not just other people, other creatures. this is altruistic behavior. if they can do it, there's hope that other people can do it as well. [bells ring] gary: i've made a whole series of films about the beginning of environmental movements in different parts of the world at different times, and in each of

the films, i found mysyself quie drawn to trying to understand what you might call the native religions or the hunter/gatherer religions, or some of the kind of peripheral cultures that you find in the united states, in russia, in china. some of those older cultures of hunter/gatherers who live close to the land often have the similar kinds of beliefs about the sacredness of the environment and the need to protect and preserve it for all future generations, because their very livelihood always depended on maintaining the quality of the environment that they lived in. tibetan buddhism, like many ofof the original sort of hunter/gatherers who lived i in eurorope, in asia, in north america had a very powerful relationship to o the land. they have a deep respect and a kind of a sacredness to the environment because that was the means of ensuring livelihood for the next generations and seven

generations to come. and so the tibetan buddhists come from that kind of tradition. so i think that's underlying a bit of their immediate sense of respect for all life. so it has a very practical side, i guguess from our point f view.. from t their point of view, it's just part of the way that they look at the worlrld, which is life is s sacred and you m must preserve i it and d you actually must even protect areas from human intervention in order to ensure a healthy future for the environment. fred: liu jianqiang is one of millions of chinese who are taking a fresh look at traditional culture. here under the guidance of chakme rinpoche, tibetan buddhism has changed the way he sees the world. translator: before, i only wrote from a legal point of view. it's wrong, for this is a a national park anand how canu destroy it? now when i read a story about fish that were kililled by a da, what i have in mind is there are millions of lives herere.

i strongly believe that i should write about it this way. i'm sure i should speak on their behalf. i shouldn't just think of what is good for us, what's good for humamans. i can clearly see my change. [chanting] fred: : observrving this newew intererest in religion and conservation, china's communist partrty is now c cautiously supporting it. translatatorformer statete counselor mr. dai bingguoo spoke at the annual l forum on ecological civilizazation and bubuddhist culture. translator: trtraditional cultue promotes hararmony between man and nature and encourages limited consnsumption and a simple way of life. we supupport this. we don''t opoppose takg from nature. we do oppose oveverexploititati. we want gold mountain, but we also want clear water and green mountain. gary: my chinese friends were

very quick to popoint out that when you see the government, as we did, making some very sort of friendly noises towards organized religions, it's a bit of a surprise often for people from outside chinana, like how is it that this government that used to be all about atheism is now sort of very friendly towards at least a schedule of religions, particularly the traditional cultural religions like b buddhism and tataoism anand confucianism? and d the fact is that the communist party is observing that tens of millions of people are becoming m more religious, and they're realizing that this might actually be an opportunity fofor them to kind f encourage these religions to be environmentally conscious and to support that side of the religions, b because that wl help people become maybe a little bit less materialistic, a little less oriented towards consumption. i think the government realizes that the era of kind of, you know, 13% growth every year

is coming to an end. pollution is going to be an issue that's going to take 10 or 20 years to sort out. so they rereally need to kinindf encourage a culture, or at least to be supportive of a cultlture that is less orientd toward consumption, placing less value than always on material gain,ececause those material gains a aren't going go be as s easy to get in the futue as they have been in the past. martin palmer: i think one of the things that i've seen over the last few years, and increasingly so, is a sense that if there is going to be some kind of chinese solution to these issues, it is going to come out of chinese traditional culture. so my sense is that this partnership between religion and the government around environment t is only going to get stronger and stronger. fred: there's hope these handshakes signal real support for ancient traditions of respect for nature in a society that has paid a heavy environmental price for progress in recent decades. ñoln

[applause] danny: i do want to first of all thank kenny [indistinct] and also nina simone for--simon for her--for their extraordinary work and for providing me with this opopportunity to b be herere ate 24th celebration of bioneers. i tried to remember the last time i was here, and it must've been at least a decade ago. and it's has grown