10am     Film training with a global edge

Practical workshop on the media run by WORLDwrite: This challenging and exciting session will get your creative juices flowing, your brain twitching and tickle your film making fancies.
Hosted by the UK based education charity and NGO WORLDwrite and led by a documentary film crew fresh off the plane from Ghana this session will include:
A first screening of the rushes for the film - The New Missionary Position - and a chance to quiz the crew
A screening of the documentary short on Fair Trade - The Bitter Aftertaste
A five minute glimpse of Corruptababble and Flush it and see, two volunteer made films which question contemporary development speak
A hands on hour with Director of Photography (Chew on it Productions) and film tutor Ian Foster where participants will learn the elements of broadcast quality camera work for documentary using Mini DV and PD170 DV CAMS.
Participants will have a go with the crew at conducting interviews and developing a short presenter led piece. Unlike Geldoff's claim to speak for millions in the developing world, we will consider ways to ensure the truth gets told, objectivity is assured and well meaning but ignorant ideas like "advocacy" are outlawed. As participants get miced up with the latest in wireless radio kit this session could produce a three minute wonder fit for a film festival or Channel 4 open slot. Forget fortune get ready for infamy!
The crew are:
Ceri Dingle - Director of WORLDwrite
Ian Foster - Director of Photography, Chew on it Productions
Helen Sewell - WORLDwrite volunteer since school
Andrew Hirst - Camera
Sadhavi Sharma - Researcher
Viv Regan - Producer

This workshop is part of The Great Debate schools programme

10am     Energy Futures: Tilting at Windmills

Chair: Dave O'Toole, The Great Debate

The debate over how we should generate our power to best tackle global warming continues to divide opinion. The EU has set a target for renewable energy of 22 per cent by 2010 but moves to build wind farms continue to meet opposition in the UK. Germany is already the world's largest wind power producer but the news that the German parliament has approved plans to double the country’s 15000 turbines over the next 16 years has been met with angry protests.
In May 2004 James Lovelock the noted environmentalist put forward the proposal that if we were really serious about tackling global warming we had no alternative but to embrace nuclear power. So what is the future of power generation and why does this issue so divide opinion?
with

Sir Bernard Ingham, secretary to Supporters of Nuclear Energy (SONE)
Prof Keith Barnham, Scientists for Global Responsibility
Ian Burdon, Chair, North East Renewable Energy Group

Click here for further details including statements by speakers
Tilting at Windmills: proceedings of the Energy Futures debate

Film training with a global edge     Energy Futures     What Future for Environmentalism?

11:45am     Aspirations for the Developing World

Chair: Pauline Hadaway, Director, Belfast Exposed

Do people in developing world want what we have? Is it reasonable to encourage them to aspire to a Western standard of living? What does the term ‘sustainable development’ offer for developing countries?
Today nearly half of the world’s 6 billion people lives on less than $2 per day and between 1 and 2½ billion people do not have access to safe drinking water. Three million people die each year from water borne diseases. According to the 2003 Human Development Report 54 countries became poorer during the 1990s. While the Millennium Development Goals include halving the proportion of people living in extreme poverty by 2015 there is an implicit acceptance that countries in sub Saharan Africa will not reach the goals for poverty eradication until 2147, and for child mortality until 2167. Yet there are no plans for major international investment in developing countries, especially for essential infrastructure related to, for example water supply, water and sewage treatment. Rather the urge in both the developed and developing world is to consume less. We are told that large scale bold schemes which offer developing modern Western style water provision should be avoided. Why? What is wrong with the approach to water supply established in the developed world? What does this imply for the aspirations of people in the developing world? Is this acceptable? Is there anything that can be done?
with

Ceri Dingle, Director, WORLDwrite
Geoff Parkin, Lecturer in Water Resources, Civil Engineering & Geosciences, Newcastle University

2.15pm     Debating Matters Extra

Sixth Form Debate on pollution in association with Institute of Ideas

"Reducing pollution should be society’s top priority"

Chair: Jon Bryan, The Great Debate

Judges: Sir Bernard Ingham, Tony Gilland, Jon Pugh

Click here for full details of the Debating Matters competition

3.30pm     What Future for Environmentalism?

Plenary debate sponsored by the RSA
Chair: Caspar Hewett, The Great Debate

Is the environmental debate dead? Today environmental ideas are taught in schools, discussed in the House of Commons and debated at world summits. We are so used to hearing that the global environment is getting worse thanks to human activity that we rarely, if ever, question it. Everyone from engineers to Presidents call themselves environmentalists. What does this mean? As enviromental ideas have become mainstream they have been less and less open to critical scrutiny – we are increasingly expected to accept claims made about the environment on faith rather than scientific evidence and any questioning of such claims is seen as beyond the pale. This session will scrutinize the current state of environmental thought and will ask questions about the consequences of its dominance for our future.
with

Viv Regan, Assistant Director, WORLDwrite
Roger Higman, Environmental Limits Co-ordinator, Friends of the Earth
Tony Gilland, Science and Society Director, Institute of Ideas

Click Here for part edited transcript of this debate