>> welcome to "global 3000." new life in the step -- villagers in tanzania are replanting forests, and encouraging the rains to return. >> precious and scarce -- in many regions of the world, fresh water is in short supply. what's the solution? ♪ in lebanon too, water supplies are dwindling, but women are stepping in and planting the answer.

♪ an unforgettable image. a column of smoke rises over the harbor of lebanon's capital beirut. 2750 tons of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer, exploded here on 4th august 2020, devastating swathes of the city. 200 people died and there was an estimated 13 billion euros in damages. too much for crisis-rocked lebanon. ♪ yet once upon a time, the country was booming. beirut was a cosmopolitan and sophisticated city. but then, in 1975, civil war broke out. political and religious groups battled for supremacy, tearing the country apart. the war only ended in 1990. today, much of the population lives in poverty. the infastructure has largely collapsed, including waste collection. the local currency has lost 90% of its value. many struggle to afford the very basics food, heating and gas.

and is reallyough forhe many refugees here too. but there are some projects offering hope. ♪ >> it looks like a game. and it really is child's play since every throw is a goal. the small brown balls that these women are throwing into the bekaa valley are so-called seed bombs. the balls contain plant seeds. an outer layer of clay protects them from birds and rodents. when it rains, the balls soak up water and then the plants grow all by themselves. the fertile plateau of the bekaa valley used to be famous for its lush cedar forests. a cedar tree even ended up on the country's flag. however, growing settlements and uncontrolled deforestation have meant that there is hardly anything left of the original

forests, explains a coordinator from the aid organization "salam ladc." >> we never used to think about the importance of trees. we might sit under a tree in the shade, but we never asked ourselves, "where did it come from? who planted it?" it was only through this project we realized how much effort it is to regreen a country. >> reforesting lebanon is just one goal of salam. the work here is also supposed to bring people together who otherwise have little to do with each other, says batoul ibrahim, who fled from her syrian homeland to neighboring lebanon 10 years ago. >> the women here all work wonderfully together, whether they come from syria, perlstein, or lebanon. we originally met through the project, but now we are like sisters. we laugh together, we tell jokes, it makes the work easier. >> some of the women live in

informal settlements. others have a solid roof over their heads, like batoul ibrahim from syria. nevertheless, she says life in lebanon is not easy for her. her husband is unemployed and her daughter regularly needs expensive medication. without the eight us dollars she receives for each day's work, the family would have no income. >> this project is more than just a job that brings in money. it lets me do something good for nature and the environment. i now live in lebanon. it's become my new home. and i want to serve this home, even if it is only a small contribution. ♪ >> lebanon was once called the "switzlerland of the middle east" because of its wealth. in the meantime, however, almost 80% of its nearly 7 million inhabitants live in poverty.

the situation is particularly dire for the more than 1.5 million refugees, most of whom come from syria. their high number has led to mounting social tensions in the country. suzanne el amqi has experienced it herself. she feeds her family of five with the money from the reforestation project. she's lebanese but her husband is palestinian. their children are therefore considered foreigners. >> there's smuch discrimination in our country. even my children feel it. because of their palestinian father, they're not allowed to go to the local school. i wish my children could grow up like any normal lebanese child. instead, they're excluded from many things. and my husband isn't allowed to take certain jobs, just because he's palestinian. >> nationality does not play any role in the "trees for

lebanon" initiative. the only condition for participants is that they do not have another means of income. because the project especially wants to help those most in need. today the women are making seed bombs for wild thyme and cistus. in addition to reforestation, the project also wants to plant crops that can later be harvested. after sifting the soil, the women add the clay that will later form the hard outer layer of the seed balls. when both are mixed, the seeds go in. everything is then mixed with water and kneaded. it's a sociable process. the group then sits together and shapes the individual seed balls. ♪

♪ [chatter] >> when the balls are finished, they need to dry in the sun for at least a day. and then they're ready, and new life can be created from them. >> i'm reforesting lebanon, it's amazing! my children will think me. they will benefit from it. and even when none of us are here anymore, i've done something good for the future of our world. ♪ >> for today, the women have finished their work. ♪ [singing] >> the project's aim is to release a total of 600,000 seed bombs by the time the reforestation project ends in august next year. it would go a long way towards bringing back the country's famous trees.

♪ >> drinking, washing, cooking, industrial production, farming, without water, we humans are lost. yet according to the u.n., as many as 2.3 billion people live in areas dogged by water shortages. that's around 30% of the global population. by mid-century, our planet could well have a population of 10 billion, with an accompanying rise in the demand for water. but water supplies are already dwindling. many natural reservoirs are already over-used, or have been contaminated with sewage. we're on the brink of a global water crisis. could our oceans offer a solution? ♪ >> cape town was the first major city to risk running out of water, but it's not going to be the last. jakarta, london, beijing, tokyo could all face their own day zero in the

coming decades. >> most parts of the world at least for a month a year are experiencing some water stress. >> the gap between supply and demand of water is narrowing down. >> but how can that be? our blue planet is awash with water. more than one billion trillion liters to be precise the problem is that 97% of earth's water is salty, and most of the freshwater is frozen in ice caps less than 1% of the earth's water is drinkable. less than 1% of the earth's water is drinkable. that makes one solution pecially promising. >> "desalination." >> "desalination." >> desalination seems a pretty straight forward solution: you take that undrinkable lt water, remove the salt, and end up with an unlimited supply of freshwater. so, why are we not building more desalination plants? thermal desalination uses heat.

salt's boiling point is a lot higher than water's, so if you boil salt water, only freshwater will evaporate, leaving all the salt behind. membrane desalination uses pressure. saltwater, here colored in red for clarity, is pressed through a membrane that is only partially permeable. freshwater can pass through, here colored in blue, but the salt is trapped on the other side. the technology didn't improve much until the 19th century, when industrialization and populati growth encouraged more research. >> population growth is the main driver for increasing water scarcity. >> and soon, another fact or could make desalination even

more crucial -- global warming. ♪ >> as the climate warms more water will evaporate. and as aristotle noticed, more vapor equals more clouds, equals more rain. but that rain will not fall evenly. this map shows how supervision will change as the climate it's up. regions in purple will get more rain, those in orange less. now compare it with this other map. these red dots point at areas that are already experiencing water scarcity today. dry areas like the middle east and california will see even less rainfall. other countries like india will have more rain in the monsoon season, but less in the dry season, when people need it most. this will make desalination even more popular. boiling billions of liters of

water takes a lot of energy. >> in the middle east, the availability of oil, especially fossil fuels, makes the thermal processes cheaper, but for other types it can be 25-30 times more expensive. >> but that energy doesn't have to come from fossil fuels. a startup in berlin has a sustainable alternative. >> so the water comes from the borehole tank to the system. and after that, it's going through the booster pump. it's a clean, desalinated water, with green energy. >> green energy -- that's the key to the company's success. this is one of their plants in kenya. these solar panels keep the cost of water low in villages like this, where electricity is not available.

♪ >> we get water for free, we get electricity from solar and wind for free, so we can now produce 1000 liters for $.50. this price is actually competitive to a clean water from the river or from the boreholes. >> but there is another problem. what do you do with this water that's left behind? >> so we forced all this salt out of the water to produce our freshwater. but now the salt is still contained within our substance, but it's just in a smaller volume, so it's more salty. ♪ >> this water is called "brine." >> at the global level we , produce more brine than we produce salinated water. >> you've got your pipe that comes out of the desalination plant. you're discharging hypersaline water here.

and as it flows out, it will sink because it's more dense. the salinity and the temperature can also deplete the oxygen available and this is actually what causes the organisms more damage, just the lack of oxygen. they are basically suffocating. >> brine can also contain chemicals that can be harmful to sea life. but what if this waste could become a resource? ♪ tomatoes, seaweed, and certain fish can tolerate high salinity. boreal light uses brine to cultivate them in tubs like this. >> at the ment, th technologies are available f brine management, but those are on a very small scale. the challenge is how we can transform those small-scale technologies into a large-scale operio >> desalination is not magic forma. the procesmust become more efficient before low-income

countries can afford it. desalination plants must convert from fossil fuels to renewable energies to limit emissions. and the whole industry needs to come up with a plan to deal with this brine. but facilities like this are today cape town is doing a lot better and the dam is full. the city was rushing to build desalination plants and avoid "day zero." but the solution was not desalination or any other technology. people became water-wise. they radically changed their water use, and they valued water for the essential and irreplaceable substance that it is. >> and we'll stay with the topic of water shortages. climate-change is causing drought in many countries like tanzania. but in the region of arusha our

reporter thuku kariuki witnessed something extraordinary. ♪ >> here in engaruka, a village in northern tanzania, hardly anyone has a tv. that's why linda mlimbo brings a small mobile cinema with her. she was here a few months ago on behalf of the "lead foundation," a tanzanian conservation organization. >> i want to show a film about kisiki hai here today. "kisiki hai" means living tree stump. we will start with announcements in the village and later in the evening, we will show the film. >> but where is everyone? it's still early afternoon, and the villagers are in their

fields, digging in the bone-dry earth. holes in the earth as far as the eye can see. it seems like all 7,000 residents are out and about. [chatter] what's going on? they're digging here because of another movie presented by linda mlimbo and the lead foundation. it was called "just diggit". john mune remembers it well as he digs a trench and fills it with grass seed. >> the film taught me that you can do something about the dryness and drought of recent years. we can till the land, and create water basins, which we fill with seeds to help the fields recover. >> in recent years, fields here have continued to fall victim to desertification. the persistent drought is a consequence of climate change. can anyone really fight back?

it is 5:00 p.m., and linda mlimbo's colleague makes an announcement that the film screening is taking place that evening. it's a welcome change for the villagers. they only get to see a film every few months. the children are excited to see what's coming. now the final touches. linda mlimbo has been doing this for three years. >> the film explains how to protect your land from drought. people have cut down their trees many times in recent years. the land became barren and the harvests got worse. now we want to show people how to reclaim that moisture, so that their yields increase and

they have enough pasture to feed their families. >> it's finally show time. ♪ it starts with jaymondi, a very popular comedian in tanzania. why he's riding a bicycle through the fields is a mystery. what's more important is what he hears. ♪ [thumping] >> get out of here! we we!

get out of here! you've lost your mind. don't let me catch you cutting down any more trees! i'll fry you like an egg, because i have the frying pan here! i declare war on you. let's do that together. if i catch one more person cutting down a tree! don't you want it to rain? [chatter] >> everyone in engaruka wants rain and the film is well received. people here have become familiar with drought over the past few years. what it means to be thirsty all day long. the film showed the villagers that small shrubs or tree stumps can grow into large trees if given a chance. first, viable plants are selected. next, they're pruned so that only the strongest shoots remain. then the trees must be marked for everyone to see. and importantly, the plants must be protected from hungry

cattle. ♪ according to the campaign, this method has managed to save over nine million trees in tanzania. a re-greening measure of this magnitude has an impact on the local weather and can also ing rain. this means the country will cool down, and crop yields will improve. at least in theory. >> in engaruka, it's still a dream though. the last few months have seen 30 percent less precipitation than in previous years. which is one reason why they are digging the rain basins. according to the campaign, there are now over 200,000 such basins in tanzania and kenya. and all this just because people saw a movie? in reality, people here earn 1 euro 50 per basin. diligent workers like dina hosea can manage five a day.

>> we make money digging now. later, when the grass has grown, it will benefit both our cattle and us because we save ourselves the trouble of carrying food to the cattle. if we employ these practices, they will help us take care of our livestock. >> rainwater normally evaporates on the dry soil, but now it can collect in the basins. this gives the water more time to seep into the soil and this allows vegetation to grow not on inside e basins but also all around them. this re-greening program is in full swing and gaining in popularity. strategies like this one have an impact on the global climate and could even help to slow down global warming. and the people of engaruka are doing their part.

>> how do people around the world live? for this wees mobile living rooms, we go to armenia. ♪ >> hello, come on in. these are my sons. and my mother. my name is ani manuk, i'm an iraqi armenian. in 2004 we fled from iraq to armenia because of the war. ♪ this doll was first thing i grabbed. my father said it was too big to take with us, but i said i wouldn't go without it. i got the doll when i was two,

we were on a trip in armenia. i'm 46 now, so this doll is 44. ♪ i'll just get these cups out and make us some tea. we always drink tea from these cups -- istikans -- they're typical teacups in iraq. we use them with saucers like these. once the water's boiling we put in the tea, let it simmer, turn off the heat, let it sit for a couple of minutes and pour it into the cups. it has to be sweet, then it's perfect. here's your tea. you have to serve tea in very

beautiful cups. the more you respect your guest, the more expensive the cups! ♪ this is our son's turtle, he got it for his birthday. we call it godzilla. look, if you press on this spot it pees! [laughs] we've had the fish tank much longer than the turtle. i've got some new fish. have a look. guppies. sitting in front of the fish tank when you're angry has a calming effect. bye! take care!

♪ >> that's all from us that "global 3000" this week. write to us at global3000@dw.com, and find us on facebook too, dw global ideas. see you next time.

♪ >> this is "dw news" live from berlin. the united nations secretary-general says ukraine's energy belongs to raine. antonio guterres called on russia not to cut ukraine from the power grid, something kyiv says moscow is planning to do. also, olaf scholz testifies about a