host: welcome to “global 3000”" hunted survivors -- are namibia's hyenas loved by anyone? seeded clouds -- making rain in the united arab emirates. and hope for peace in colombia -- why one former member of the farc has ditched his weapons for paddles. for more than 50 years, colombia was entangled in civil

war. it left 200,000 people dead and more than eight million displaced. in 2016, the government and the farc rebels finally signed a peace agreement. the farc laid down their weapons in exchange for promises of political participation and better living standards. now, six years later, what is the state of things in the country? were the promises kept? reporter: when's he out on the water, pato forgets all his problems. it's as if he and his boat become one, just like in the old days. as a former farc rebel fighting government troops, he was often out on the river. pato was actually his cover name. it means "duck.” he knows virtually every stone here. today, he shows tourists around

the former war zone, part of an initiative aimed at reintegrating former rebels back into society. pato: we always say that we've swapped our weapons for a paddle. this is one of the best examples of transitioning to peace. peace is always better than war. only a crazy person would choose war over peace. reporter: the beauty of the caqueta region is breathtaking. it was previously a dangerous red zone. pato explains how former farmers took up arms as farc guerillas, and began fighting government soldiers and paramilitary groups, here in this area. five years ago, the guerillas signed a peace deal and laid down their arms. since then, the tourists have been coming. laurie:

to come here and experience it in person with first-hand witnesses to that incredible history, it's incredible. reporter: the rafting project is one small success story in a sea of problems. many farmers were happy to see pato rehabilitated, as the farc were fighting for farmers' interests. but others here still call him a terrorist. pato spent time in prison for planning a bomb attack. many still want nothing to do with him. and while he's out rowing, he says the current president is busily undermining the peace treaty signed with the rebels. pato: what was agreed upon sounds good on paper, but it's not being implemented. the government is not addressing the root causes of the conflict. there's a lack of investment in rural areas, in education. the problems that led to the conflict have not gone away.

reporter: the unrest is also escalating again. the farc's former base lies in idyllic surroundings, closely guarded by the military. but the area isn't safe. other armed groups have emerged. drug gangs are fighting paramilitary groups and other guerillas. some are also seeking revenge on former farc rebels, who are now vulnerable. yorleny's husband is one of hundreds who has taken up arms again. 300 former farc rebels have been murdered so far. the peace process is on shaky ground. yorleny: i look at my son and feel sad. i thought the peace process would bring change, at least that our family would be together again. reporter: more than 50 years of civil war have left their mark. the peace deal has not brought peace. instead, the power structures

are more complex and the outbreaks of violence more unpredictable. many of the victims of that violence come to civil rights activist luz dary garzon. today, once again, she's accompanying a group of farmers during a visit to the authorities in the provincial capital. armed men drove them from their land, and they need accommodation. such cases are common in caqueta. luz: no, this isn't a peaceful country. these things happen every day, people are just driven from their land. reporter: often, land is seized to form drug trafficking routes, or coca plantations. it's not clear who was behind this attack, maybe guerillas or government forces, or maybe former farc fighters. the farmers have lost everything. >> people came, all dressed in black with masked faces. they said we had 24 hours to leave. >> since the peace deal, other groups have come.

they drive out entire families. reporter: luz dary garzon is also taking risks, by criticizing the state for its lack of action. 171 activists like her were murdered last year and more than 70 so far this year. we ask her who she thinks should be the next president. luz: answering questions like that has a price. it would cost us our lives, to say openly that our president is not safeguarding our rights. but nothing is being done. we continue to live with the same conflict, the same needs. there's been no restoring of human rights. reporter: is there a chance of a new start? ex-rebel pato is hoping that colombia's future president will take the peace process seriously. that the president will fight social injustice and poverty. in the meantime, he's heading back to the water.

out rafting with the tourists is where he feels free. pato: you just forget the rest of the world. you forget problems with bank accounts and cellphones, everything. reporter: pato has no plans to take up arms again. he says he has committed to peace, once and for all. host: the amount of rain that falls om the s depends on where you are on the planet, the season, and the local weather patterns. in the united arab emirates, the amount of rainfall totals only around 78 liters per square meter, per year. in tropical colombia, meanwhile, that figure is far higher, 3240 liters. climate change is making such differences even more extreme. studies at the potsdam

institute for climate impact research have shown that, put simply, wet regions are likely to become wetter, and arid regions drier. in our next report, we learn what people in the united arab emirates are doing to generate plane with an unconventional apayload -- salt cartridges --s in the hope of making the clouds cry. he's a rainmaker. and today, he fancies his chances. the 57-year-old swede makes one last check before take-off. he has just three hours to get his charge into the clouds above the arab emirates. a challenging task. anders: the cloud seeding, that is a little bit unusual for a person like me, because i've spent most of my career trying to avoid clouds, for the comfort of the passengers. whereas now i fly, not

necessarily inside of the cloud, but just at the edge of it, and it can be quite turbulent. reporter: lift-off from the desert into the clouds, with hazy visibility and a temperature of 35 degrees celsius. it's a mission with an ambitious goal. water is scarce in the emirates, but consumed in abundance in glitzy metropolises like dubai. the construction industry is booming, and every year around 800,000 people move to the oil-rich federation, despite rising temperatures and falling groundwater levels. crop cultivation in the emirates is becoming increasingly difficult. salah al hamadi thought he'd try his hand at farming when he retired five years ago. the 63-year-old grows figs, pomegranates, maize, and dates on his small plot of land on the outskirts of dubai. he fetches the water from a well 300 meters deep.

every year, the level drops further. he can water his fruits for a maximum of three hours a day. he tells us that many wither in the blazing heat and cannot be sold. salah al hamadi often looks to a higher power for help. salah: we pray for rain, imploring the almighty to provide us with water. without water, man is worth nothing. reporter: at the national center for meteorology in abu dhabi, scientists are trying more down to earth methods. ahmed al kamali presents the current weather data to the team and ventures a forecast as to which clouds will appear when and where. clouds are by no means rare over the emirates. but far too often they don't bring rain. with their four propeller planes, the scientists therefore shoot sodium and

potassium chloride into the clouds. the salt particles bind water, become heavy, and rain down. interestingly, the scientists say their activities don't lead to less rain elsewhere. they say the results from 15 years of practice are encouraging. ahmed: we have done recently a study about the enhancement of rainfall and it has turned out that the cloud-seeding actually in the uae increases the rainfall by about 23% on average. on best situation, it can reach up to around 35% of enhancing of rainfall. reporter: heavy clouds are gathering in the sky over the gulf. it's important that things now proceed quickly. ahmed al kamali radios anders mard and gives him the coordinates of a promising cumulus cloud. the pilot picks up the trail

and steers towards it. timing is everything now. anders: there's so many things going on at the same time. you have to fly the airplane, you have to navigate around the clouds so that in time and space you are in the correct place, but you must also navigate in relation to the actual cloud formations. reporter: on command, anders mard fires four rounds, slowly turning as he does so. in the control room, the meteorologists are already looking for the next cloud that he can head for. he seeds up to 20 in three hours. success often follows very quickly. happy moments for the whole team. anders: i am convinced this technique works.

and i'm not saying that there might not be some other method that is conceived in the future which is possibly a better method. but at the moment, i believe in what we are doing. reporter: rain is often seen as a blessing in the desert. weather phenena have fascinated salah al hamadi since he was a child. whenever he can, the farmer from dubai films rain. the devout muslim considers it legitimate that man, not allah, makes it. salah: the koran doesn't forbid science. on the contrary. it's important that people find ways to invent things that are of benefit to humanity. in the past, people didn't really think too much about clouds. but today it's a necessity, we have to look for ways to get more water. reporter: critics say the emirates' multi-million-dollar seeding program is unscientific and that its apparent success remains unproven -- claims

rejected by the head of the national meteorology center. he also points out that desalinating seawater is many times more expensive than cloud-seeding. abdullah: it is a success, and we encourage a lot of people we are already involved with the world meteorological organization that all the output of this project will be available for them, and many countries try to approach us and get benefit of output of this project. reporter: anders mard climbs out of his plane, exhausted but happy. he fired off 40 of his cartridges, successfully seeding four clouds. anders: today i was a rainmaker. yes. i can proudly say so. reporter: anders mard's sorties might not be able to stop climate change or resolve the lack of water, but they can at least generate a little more of that precious

commodity, rain. host: predators. they are beautiful, fascinating, and dangerous. and people have always lived alongside them. in namibia, these animals are tourist magnets, but they often represent a big problem for many farmers. most predators now live in reserves, state-run national parks, or protected zones, run by local communities or tourist organizations. for a long time, many of these animals have been despised and hunted by people. including hyenas. reporter: the eleton coast in northweste namibia is home to brown hyenas, also known as strandwolves. emsie: hyenas are very important in the ecosystem. and they've got a very important role to play, but they're portrayed as the bad guys, and that's what people think about hyenas in general.

>> they're forever killing our goats. but our hands are cut off and we can do nothing about it. but if the farmers come and say, we're killing them now, i understand the appeal. phineas: we're now living in a nature reserve, alongside wild animals. we can earn as much with them now as we do with goats and sheep. so i no longer shoot them. reporter: the hyenas are perfectly adapted to the extreme desert conditions and icy cold benguela ocean current. biologist emsie verwey has been studying the animals here for seven years and is still fascinated by them. she's a science coordinator for a tourism company that supports conservation projects in the region.

emsie: i've got a lot of respect for hyenas. because to survive as a large scavenger in the desert, it's no mean feat. and they're also very social. when they're out there, they're solitary, so you just see these singleyenas outhere. but when they're back at the den, when there are cubs at the den, there's a lot of social going on. there's a lot of time spent withhe cubs, playing with cubs, grooming the cubs. reporter: verwey discovered a network of dens off the coast where packs of sandwolves gather to socialize and share their catch. they carry carcasses dozens of kilometers through the desert to feed to their cubs in the dens. scavenger animals like these prevent diseases from spreading, making them important for livestock farming. but their reputation as predators means they're mercilessly hunted. emsie: people put out poison for lions, for leopards and

cheetahs. and then the hyenas would be by catch of that. people are afraid of hyenas, so people don't appreciate the value of brown hyenas. and they're scared of the hyenas, so people would throw stones at them, and chase them with cars. reporter: seven years of drought have ravaged the region. the animals here have to travel ever greater distances in search of food. this means they cross paths with farmers, like immanuel gurirab, who are now losing more and more livestock to predators. >> the incident took place at farm leukop in the kunene region last week, where two lions killed 66 goats and 10 sheep belonging to farmer immanuel gurirab. reporter: as a result of the lion attack, gurirab lost half of his herd -- a sizable financial loss for the farmer.

the government compensates farmers after such incidents, but at a rate around half of market value. immanuel: the wild animals from the desert, the lions, the elephants cause us a lot of problems. we don't gain anything from having wild animals here, they bring us nothing. our livestock are our income, how we earn our living. reporter: near his stall, gurirab has discovered fresh hyena tracks. brown hyenas don't hunt goats, but the tracks could have been made by spotted hyenas, a more aggressive species. immanuel: if the government doesn't take care of the hyenas, we have no choicewe have to shoot them.

that's the plan. reporter: when he was a cattle herder, phineas kasaona also killed hyenas and lions. today, he protects them. he's a ranger and member of the anabeb community reserve. since the 1990's, farmers like kasoana have joined neighbors to create their own nature reserves, which now cover about one-fih of namibia's landmass. last night, elephants raided a neighbor's vegetable patch. so for the next few nights, kasaona will stand guard. despite the problems they cause, the farmers still want to protect the animals. phineas: things have changed. back in the day, if a hyena took one of your animals, you hunted it down and killed it. today we live in a new world with laws that protect wild animals.

and if we take care of them, we can even live from them. so we should try to live together. we do better then. reporter: farmers have agreed on limiting livestock so that both wild and farm animals can coexist. since antelope populations increased, attacks by wild predators have gone down. back on the skeletonoast, a ranger informs very that an elephant calf is missing. the biologist fears the worst. she finds the calf halfway to a watering hole. due to the ongoing drought, the mother couldn't lactate. there is no hope for the young elephant. emsie: it's part of life out here. everyone dies, few live. bushe was born yesterday. so it seems such a waste for --

not to have a life out here. yeah, so i love all animals. and you do what you can. but eventually, life must get on. and this is part of it. death is a part of life. reporter: long periods of drought have made the fight for surviva even harder here. hyenas and other animals must search for new living environments. but with the help of researchers like emsie verwey and community-based conservaon efforts, there's still a chance in namibia, for people and animals to re-adapt and forge a life out of the desert.

>> i am -- >> -- a global teen. host: this week, our global teen is john mwangi, from kenya. he liv in gikuni, a district of kiambu. he has four brothers and a sister. john: in my free time i like watching football, riding my ke, and tching ctoons, visiting friends, and making jokes. i like local music, like odi wa muranga. they talk about the youth, how they are doing, how they don't

have jobs, and how they are hustling. i like to go to school because of many reasons. one is that i am going to get my career there, i'm going to be educated there, and when i go through education, i am going to get a good job. in the future, i want to become an engineer or a businessman, because i have seen a businessman or a person who is doing business. i don't know what is going to happen in my future because i have seen many people who

wanted to become pilot, and in other way they are the same people is see loitering around. others want to become doctors when in school but when they grow up they end up taking bhangi. that makes me afraid. what makes me happy is family, friends. when i am alone, i can call a friend or visit a friend. i can also get to tell my mother my problems and that makes me happy. host: that's all from us at “global 3000” this week. thanks for watching. we'd love to hear from you, so drop us a line to

global3000@dw.com, and visit us on facebook too, dw global ideas. we're back next week. see you then, and take care. ♪ [captioning performed by the national captioning institute,

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