♪ >> shining solution: with energy generated from farm waste, one ugandan is bringing light to villages. ♪ >> fearsome neighbour: to many on taiwan's matsu islands, china china feels perilously close. >> i introduced myself and said, "hi, i'm cristian. i'm from siloé," and everyone in the room said "oooh." [laughter] it's really danagerous there! >> how do you ditch a bad reputation? residents of one colombian slum have an idea!

♪ >> it's unusual to see kristin without a -- to see christian hoyos without a spray-can in his hand. the alias of the graffiti artist from one of colombia's most notorious slums is apu siloé. "apu" means mountain in quechua. siloé is the hill that he calls home. >> what you see from the outside is horrible. the people are afraid to come into our neighborhood because they don't know how we tick. the media have exploited us in order to stoke this fear. people believe the media and don't want to get anywhere near us. >> cristian wants to fight the stigma from the inside out. today he's working with seventh graders on murals that emphasize siloé's beauty. the aim is to counter the

message the kids get from everywhere else - that their home is nothing to be proud of. >> many people can't get jobs because they come from siloé. they have to muddle through to make a living, feed their families without proper work. >> even the girls and boys at this school are bothered by their neighborhood's poor reputation. >> it makes me sad, depressed. >> somehow some people disappointment. if they don't know this place, how can they presume to judge? that makes me sad, depressed. my neighborhood is really sociable, we belong together. >> cristian, aka apu siloé, reacts to the rejection he faces with his art. but decades of being ostracized have left their mark. apu sees himself as part of a growing community that wants to make these scars visible.

>> there are many processes of remembrance in this neighborhood. people come and say, "ah! this happened here, and that there." that's why people are as they are. that's why they live here. how nice, that they're doing better now. >> outside the schoolyard, david gómez is meeting a group of foreign visitors. he shows them the slum with the aim of sweeping away the clichés. he films the tours in order to show siloe even to the people who'll never get there. after the biggest protests in colombia's more recent history, this is a special thing for him. >> if they let us in, you'll be in a place where crimes against humanity were committed. >> 2021: mass demonstrations in colombia. cali was the epicenter of the discontent. police brutally suppressed the protests in the impoverished neighborhood of siloé. a planned tax reform triggered

the protests. but soon they were about more - poverty, inequality, corruption. the violence of the security forces shocked the world. the un called them out on human rights violations. just in siloé alone, more than a dozen people died during the protests. >> how are you? good? can we come in? you just stay over there and we'll go there. >> come in! >> here on the second floor, they found daniel sanchez' completely charred body. >> a fire had started in the shop. several people were burned alive. a young demonstrator, daniel sanchez, had been arrested earlier by the police. residents suspect that the dollarcity branch store was used as a torture center and then set alight by the security forces to eliminate evidence. even two years later, the case has not been brought to justice. >> a minute of silence for the

victims at dollarcity in siloé. thanks! >> david has lived all his life in siloé. he knows the place like the back of his hand. for more than two decades, david has been driven by an idea -- understanding your own history in order to create a better community in the future. >> we started to recover the history of siloé and we have turned that history into memory so that people understand who we are, where we come from and where we are going >> he's set up a museum in the heart of siloé. it tells the story of the neighborhood and displays its cultural idiosyncrasies. right now the roof is being repaired, so there's a large part of the exhibition in storage.

[chatter] an artist from the barrio painted that, someone from the front lines of the demonstrators. see, it's on canvas. >> many residents have brought over memorabilia from the protests. >> but even gustavo petro,the new, left-leaning president, has found a place in the museum as the person on whom the poor have pinned their hopes. >> let's go to abelardo? ready? ok, let's go. >> david winds up the tour by taking the foreigners to a motorcycle shop. it belongs to abelardo aranda, the father of michael andres, who also fell victim to the violence of the protests. >> they called me at 5:00 p.m. determined that michael andres

was shot and wounded. his mother went to him and spoke with him. he said he was doing ok, that he would survive, and we should look after his daughter. but at 7 p.m. in the hospital -- andres died at 7:00 p.m. >> he's still waiting for the government to address the case. that's why aranda is a member of siloé's "people's court." it symbolically passes judgements on police and politicians. it's one of the ways the residents fight against their own powerlessness. >> i will keep on fighting for my son's memory and for the dreams of young people in siloé. and to ensure that something like that never happens again here.

>> the government does very little for young people. and the protests didn't change that. so the community had to learn to support itself. >> first we've got to strengthen our consciousness. we've got to stop believing everything that's said about us. they say we're bad, but that's not true. >> late in the evening, graffiti artist cristian hoyos is back from his project at the school. he likes living here, too. for him, siloé isn't a place, it's a feeling. ♪ his work took on a new form during the protests. he painted portraits of the victims everywhere in siloé, or "the fallen" as he calls them. it was his way of supporting the movement. >> then let there be an end to crime. an end to trafficking. that they stop bringing weapons here.

that this little problem ends. may there be opportunities. that the stigma ends, more than anything else. more than crime, it is to end the stigma. >> that will finally allow the siloeños to be seen as they see themselves. ♪ china has long claimed sovereignty over taiwan - threatening to invade, should it attempt to establish independence. if that were to happen, people living on taiwan's matsu islands, off the chinese mainland, would find themselves on the frontline. that makes for uneasy relations with their giant neighbor. ♪ >> chen chia yin opens her fruit store every afternoon, no matter what's going on around the island. and the fact that her kids like to play with toy guns might

have something to do with where they're growing up. >> guavas? i don't have that many today. i'm getting a new order tomorrow. >> her shop is a lively place. it's become a neighborhood meeting point. chen chia yin's neighbors have overcome their initial skepticism of her. she comes from taiwan's main island. but she met her partner here, and now loves her life on the matsu islands. the archipelago is located just off the chinese mainland, but is held by taiwan -- a remnant of the chinese civil war. when general chiang kai-shek's defeated troops retreated from china to taiwan in 1949, they retained control of these islands, as a first line of defense. the islanders tell us that chen chia-yin is now one of them.

she's even taken over leadership of the community center. she takes us to a meeting she's organized there for people with dementia, and tells us more about what makes her adopted home special. >> many people in the matsu islands don't just own property in taiwan, but also on the chinese mainland. we can communicate easily in the same language. many have relatives on the mainland. when i came here, i understood that matsu belongs to taiwan, but ties to the chinese mainland are much closer. >> that's why they're glad that ferry service has resumed -- twice a day, the journey takes just 25 minutes. for three years during the pandemic, there were no ferries. the passengers are almost all taiwanese. chinese people are only allowed to come if they have close relatives on matsu. otherwise, it's forbidden.

still, china's communist leadership claims taiwan as a part of its territory. >> the threat of an invasion has unsettled chen deng chuang. he's brought his father to the community center for the dementia program, and tells us he sees things differently to many islanders. he thinks they're too china-friendly, and says there's no way he wants to live under chinese communist rule. >> that's a dictatorship over there. if they want to attack, the commander just has to drink a little alcohol and give the command. then his troops will attack. no discussion. if they're not in their right minds, then that's a risk for us. >> he was born in matsu, on the frontline, as he calls it. and he's grown up with the threat of invasion. but the sight of warships and fighter jets don't bother him as much as what happened a few weeks ago.

>> suddenly, the internet was down. some people said it was because of the conflict with china. i don't know if that's true. >> back at the fruit shop, chen chia yin tells us the story. both of the submarine internet cables had been damaged by chinese ships. whether it was deliberate or not, they don't know. what they do know, is that they had to wait two months for repairs. the microwave radio transmission they used in the meantime was bad, and weather dependent. >> now it's 310 megabytes. back then, it was just 56 to 60 kilobytes. >> it took around 15 minutes to send an sms. chen chia yin started selling chinese sim cards, along with tips on the few spots on the island with reception. if it were up to her, everything would stay as it is. her husband likes to joke that

if china ever were to invade, they'd simply swap flags, and carry on as normal. but the soldiers they deliver fruit to every morning see things differently. there are 3,000 stationed on the island. at one time, there were 50,000. jua ke -- as he's known here was one of them. the former colonel shows us the military installations from the time when the island was a restricted military zone. >> there are more than a hundred such fortresses here on matsu. see here, the enemy couldn't climb up here. we didn't need guns here -- we used cannons. if ships surrounded us, we aimed the cannons at them. >> all across the island, there are weapons, soldiers, and military installations that today function as tourist

attractions. jua ke is proud to show us his home. there are no traffic lights, drivers never honk their horns, and he never locks his car. he doesn't believe china will attack matsu. for him, the people on either side of the taiwan strait are family -- close enough that they can see each other. >> that's the matsu island that's closest to the chinese mainland -- gao deng island. it's around 9.5 kilometers off the coast. >> taipei is 200 kilometers away. the matsu islands are in between. between china and taiwan -- stuck in the middle of the conflict. that's sometimes forgotten amid the holiday vibes, slower pace and the pragmatism of the islanders. at least, until the next military maneuver.

♪ >> this time our global teen comes from tunisia. ♪ >> what's your name and where do you live? >> hi, my name is mariem, im 16 years old. i live in bou-mhel, tunis. this place is most known for its volleyball and tennis teams. >> in my freetime i like to crochet and knit. spend time with friends, solving puzzles, jigsaws, playing chess, things like that.

>> what makes me happy mostly is when im reading a very good book. but also when im with my friends, especially my close ones. and im having fun with them specifically. ♪ >> this world is honestly full of problems. but i think the biggest one right now is definitely pollution. its pretty improtant and its basically like the root cause of most problems, aside from crime and such. ♪

>> not littering, recycling. getting the chance to donate to plant trees. thats very simple stuff, its very important. ♪ >> my hopes for the future are to become an aero space engineer. i am hoping i would get there some day, to design rocket ships and stuff. i just want to do that. ♪ >> of all the people in the world without electricity 80% , live in sub-saharan africa. no power means studying or working at night is a no-go. but in uganda, there's a beacon of hope!

>> no more darkness in hellen nyamungu's house. it has been about a year since her home was connected to electricity. >> and since my children were born, they hadn't seen electricity. that was the first time for them to see. but could not believe. electricity is changing life and businesses here. >> before getting electricity, my customers used to return to their homes early due to darkness. but with power, we can sell up to midnight. >> got ngur is a remote farming community located about 300 kilometers north of uganda's capital. it borders murchison falls national park, uganda's largest largest conservation area, and home to endangered species like elephants. in 2009, when ugandan aerospace engineer peter nyeko visited the off-grid village in the

district of nwoya, he saw a need for clean energy. >> first of all, it was near the national park. so, if we could do something in nwoya which would reduce the pressure on firewood, it would be interesting to help conserve the national park. secondly, nwoya had a lot of agriculture which means that whatever we could do with agricultural waste we could do in nwoya. >> so, in 2012, peter nyeko set up a private company. today the plant in got ngur generates 64 kilowatt hours of renewable energy from agricultural biomass through a process called 'gasification'. >> due to the shape of the gasifier, just a spark is enough to get the material to heat up to a thousand degrees celsius. at that temperature it breaks down. from rice husks, maize cobs, ground nut shells, coffee husks into methane and hydrogen rocket fuel. while those gases are light,

they rise to the top. they are sucked out and go to power the engine. >> the maize harvest has just ended. after removing the kernels for food, the women used to throw these cobs away. now they supply them to peter nyeko as a raw material to produce the energy they use in their homes. >> we take it to mandulis, we sell it to them, they buy it and we get money almost three times. we get money from selling this one. then we get money from the rice husks. >> the company also uses the waste from the gasification. during the process, gasses are separated from solid biomass. it leaves behind tons of solid residue called biochar. >> there are micro pores formed in the biochar, those micro pores are perfect for bacteria to flourish.

when bacteria flourish in the biochar in the soil, they release nutrients in the ground automatically fertilising the ground. so biochar improves soil moisture, reducing the need for irrigation. biochar helps keep the soil fertile reducing the need for non-organic fertilizer. >> during the planting season, he gives the biochar out for free to about 1,000 farmers in the region. hellen nyamungu also gets some. the farmers are thus benefitting from their own waste delivered to the company. >> so, the cycle is complete and keeps on going. it's a virtuous cycle which takes us from the vicious cycle of poverty to a virtuous cycle of prosperity. >> every year, peter nyeko can produce up to 100 tons of biochar. he only uses half of it as

fertilizer. the other half is used to make clean-cooking fuel in the form of pellets. he also gives them out for free to families, to avoid cutting down trees for firewood. so far, the company has offset over 50,000 tonnes of co2 annually. >> i only use a few pellets to cook now, compared to the big volume of firewood that i was used to use. even if i light a few pellets, cooking is faster. >> in the last decade, peter nyeko has set up 5 mini-grid plants in uganda costing some 4.5 million euros, raised mainly through venture capital. his hybrid model backs up power from biomass with solar, another clean energy source. the plants generate a total of 500 kilowatts, powering more than 100 households, businesses and institutions. >> in the evening, we can switch on our biomass gasifier

and run it. by daytime, we have the solar running and we have a small amount of battery capacity to balance the load. so, we have a uniform amount of electricity 24 hours a day, every day of the year. >> peter nyeko has started a new project: electric mobility among the rural communities. he has 5 electric vehicles running in got ngur. in the near future, he wants to expand his clean energy model to zambia, botswana, and south africa, and even further away, to spain and the united kingdom. ♪ >> so find them slimy and icky, but we think worms are wonderful! they revive lifeless soil for starters! what looks like dairy or crop waste to you is food for earthworms. they process the residue and enrich the soil. it's called vermicomposting. the wigglers are the living,

breathing engineers of the underworld. indian farmers have increasingly relied on chemical fertilizers. now in many regions, the soil is reaching a breaking point. over time it has been robbed it of its nutrients. it is less productive and needs more water every season. for the worms, happiness equals cow dung from nearby dairy farms. the dung is laid out in shallow pits. this period of pre-composting is necessary to kill parasites. the earthworms eat their way through the pile in the pits. their excrement is dried and becomes vermicompost. it takes 3-5 years for the soil to adapt. but ultimately, it is just as productive. without chemical fertilizers.

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>> this is dw news live from berlin. tonight, hollywood actors join screenwriters on the picket line for the first full day of a major walkout. hollywood's biggest labor fight in decades. union members want better pay and protection against artificial intelligence. after their short-lived rebellion, what is next for the wagner mercenary group? new footage claims to show members in belarus training