New Insights | Alejandro Balaguer |TEDxPuraVida

Communicator, photojournalist, editor. Alejandro Balaguer has developed an intense professional activity in Latin America and the Caribbean for over 28 years. He is renowned for its audio-visual productions, photographic and television reports, and the educational campaigns for sustainable development and social equity in the region.

Good night and thank you very much
for being here with me

over the next 15 minutes.

But first, I want
to present you a lost case.

Let's see it.

(inaudible TV sounds)

(Judge) Case closed!

We will reopen the case.

Because this case is precisely guilty

of the heavy air pollution
we are suffering.

Humans all around the world.

This kind of media waste
is taking us away every day

from the important topics
we have to face.

We talk about food crisis,
climate crisis, multiple crises

that overwhelm us,
and precisely "trash reality"

that we receive every day,
we are going away from the key issues.

Thanks for being here.

Despite this visual chaos,

I'm still a firm believer,
as my friend Roberto Sasso said,

in the power of good images
of the testimonies and stories

to generate much needed attitude changes

to face all the evils we suffer today.

This is going to be
a quite experiential talk.

I'll tell you some personal
experiences and memories

of 30 years of walking through the field.

This still happens.

We are still in the field.

Right now I feel a little like...
how can I explain it,

as a sort of Cro-Magnon born
in the prehistory of communications

and had to put a spacesuit
like astronaut Chang

to jump to hyperspace
with the newest telecommunication,

with the new possibilities
that we are given.

I began my work very young,
at my 23, as a war correspondent.

I was a photographer for a news agency.

When I was 23
with more hair and less grey,

I came to Peru, that was then disrupted
by an internal war.

At those times, news agencies
were still working with teletypes.

As in the Korean War,
we had to type on pieces of paper

and put them there to send news.

Traveling with 200 kg of equipment
for setting up laboratories

in hotel bathrooms, in the field,
in tents... to send our photos

through AM and FM signlas.

But in this first part
of my professional experience,

where I had to face the terrible violence

of Peru in the 80s,

the first thing that struck me
was indifference.

It was the indifference
from people in the capital

that didn't want to see
the problem that was coming.

The problem that was making
farmers like these

-I took these photographs
in the early 80s -,

found themselves
in the middle of a terrible war

unleashed by Sendero Luminoso

that massacred children
in the countryside, without any mercy.

The military forces did the same,
during 10 years.

They were victims of both sides.

And in Lima, people did not want to see.

They were indifferent
to what was happening.

They said, the war
happens there, not here.

Here it will not touch anything.

Moreover, many didn't even want
to admit that a war was on.

At that time, like other
photographers, I decided to use

images as a tool to make people face

the events that were happening

and to be able to prompt change,
to raise awareness.

It took a long time, but gradually
we started to accomplish it.

Peace was also, gradually,
brought to Peru.

They were 15 years of pain
but finally that moment arrived, right?

By that time people in the cities,

thanks to the work we did, correspondents,
reporters, photographers,

work done with effort and sacrifice,

we managed somehow to wake them up,

to wake the sensitivity of people.

That generated in me
the conviction

that there was a way to go.

I must say that
this stage of my career

ends with something exceptional,

because ultimately the images taken
in those war years were used by us,

a group called Photographers of Truth

to provide enough evidence
both to generate

the necessary collective memory
so that this will not happen again,

and also to bring
to trial those responsible.

To give testimony
of what had happened.

At that time, I remember,
I had my first divorce with news.

And that was because of the media.

The agency where I was working,
an American international agency,

I will not give their name now,

decided that 20 peasants killed
in the Peruvian mountains

was no news anymore.

That the commitment
that we had with the people

could not be fulfilled
and I decided it was time to leave.

So, I entered the world of documentaries.

I started directing documentaries
focused on another context.

that of pushing the value of culture,
of natural resources,

and I also focused on social equity
in this type of productions.

But I realized that documentaries
were not enough

to call people's attention massively.

We had to capture attention
in a different way and massively.

And so, a crazy idea was born.

I will be honest, ok?

A crazy idea that I never thought
it would work but it did.

We decided to do spectacular expeditions,
multimedia expeditions.

I'm talking about the mid 90s,
when we were still using

news agencies in Somalia and the Gulf war,

and small rudimentary satellite phones

that allowed us to send some pictures,

with such big pixels, that I needed
three fingers of my hand to measure one.

It also was the dawn
of digital photography.

I said I feel like a Cro-Magnon...

Anyway, these media expeditions

were simply to partner with the Internet,

with web pages that were increasingly
beginning to be more popular.

Partnering with TV, radios and other,

and build a campaign around
our own expedition.

That was how we started
to cover daily not for a news agency,

but the adventures and misadventures
this crazy group had,

that decided to warn about, for example,

the deterioration of archaeological
monuments, flying in a hot air balloon

in forty five different
archaeological sites in Peru.

We did that in a hot air balloon.

For example here, we're flying
on Chavín de Huantar.

From that basket we were
broadcasting, as lunatics,

up there to the satellite signal.

And immediately from there
to the website that was connected

with the media and an expedition
in virtual time was generated.

People from Japan, Lima,
wherever, communicated with us.

We were touring border lines
for forty five days.

We followed whales
from Antarctica to Central America,

to warn of the need
of protecting the seas.

And through this unique experience,
people started to pay attention

to issues that did not
interest them before.

Many people are not interested
at all in archaeological monuments.

Many others are not very interested
in some kind of animal.

But through these spectacular expeditions,

we began to attract people's interest.

In those years, and especially
on that last expedition,

"Forests of the border"
when I again realized,

as in war years,

the incredible power that images had
to induce interest from people

and especially heartbreaking testimonies.

And so, during our last expedition
called "Forests of the border",

we found an ethnica group

that was facing extinction,
suffering a holocaust.

Listen.

Lake Rimachi. Behind me,
the funeral of a young man

who died of hepatitis B.

All people around him
have also contracted the disease.

(Music)

Roughly, 70% of the people
are infected with hepatitis.

(Reporter) Do you have
drugs in this clinic?

(Doctor) Right now, we don't have.
We need tracers and other important drugs.

(Doctor) We have nothing right now.

(Background sound)

Children are suffering

and dying with this disease.

Once they've got cirrhosis,
there's no solution.

So we're sorry...
about life.

How to struggle.

(Background music)

(Background music ends)

Again the invisible.
And it was amazing, right?

How this could happen around year 2000.

Again, in the city they knew nothing.

It took us long to warn about the topic.

But finally, thanks to the power
of the testimones like these,

we drew the attention
of the international community

and we didn't just vaccinate this tribe,
but the entire river region.

Five other ethnic groups were vaccinated,
and saved from extinction.

Again, the power of well-aimed images,
testimonies and messages

could break these stone hearts

that sometimes dominate us,

precisely due to that chaotic culture
I referred to at first.

At that moment, this formula
caught the attention

of a very well-known foundation
here in Costa Rica, Avina Foundation.

They sent me to Panama.

Because in Panama, the people did not know

that an island that used
to be a prison for a long time

was no longer so.

Big hotels, golf entrepreneurs and others
wanted to get access to the island.

But this island had one of the biggest
marine biodiversities on Earth

85% of the island is covered
by tropical forests.

But it was about to turn into
a disaster, basically.

There, I met with other cro-magons like me
and we made a very strong campaign

where through documentaries,
articles, and other means

we tried to make a change.

But we couldn't make it.
We couldn't managethis.

Something that caught my attention
and that now I want to present you

was the case of a baby dolphin
and a dolphin mother dying

on the sand of the beaches of Coiba.

You can see the images there.

We found that mother and her baby
that helped us a lot to generate

what I'll tell you now.

They had been trapped
with trammel fishing nets.

They were dying on the beaches of Coiba,
that you can see in the back.

For hours we tried to make them survive.

We filmed the drama
as if it was a soap opera.

At the same time trying to
keep them alive,

these beautiful and charismatic animals.

At the end, they survived
and we took them off-shore.

We freed them and they became
excellent allies.

All the scientists we interviewed,

the environmentalists
who gave their opinion

about the economic benefits
of keeping the island...

This soap opera turned around
the Panamanian public opinion,

and they said "Yes,
we want to keep Coiba".

After many actions where
other organizations helped,

Coiba became a UNESCO World Heritage site.

These dolphins also helped to create

sanctuaries for aquatic mammal
in both Panamanians seas.

It's incredible.

Panama owes much to these two dolphins.

(Applause)

(Applause ends)

From this seed Albatros Media Foundation
was born there in Panama.

We checked that things worked well,

luckily we received funding.

We become freaks
because we were giving away

TV programs to over 80 channels
in Latin America in that moment,

we are reaching millions of people,

we are trying to deal with issues
that go unnoticed

sometimes by some media.

Up until today.

We are currently producing a TV program.

An hour-long mini-series trying to alert
about climate change, social equity.

But I will not bore you, better
I'll leave you with what we do best,

with the images that I think
are going to talk for themselves.

And I'll be back.

(Music)

First I get gas into my lungs

and that makes that

when I breath I can not breathe well

and then my eyes burn.

And when it is within my body,

I feel I am weakening,

I have no energy

and I'm tired and I have
no desire to do anything.

My eyes are closing.

Weeping.

They only told me
that they have lead in their blood.

(Chopping wood,
birds chirping)

(Singing in Embera language)

[Darién, Panama]

All ecology,

all biodiversity,

the entire biosphere reserve.

We must take care of both,

but we must empower indigenous people

that have been taking care of them
since thousands of years ago.

I want to pacify
all that is in danger.

For my future generations.

For the world.

What a powerful message!

Without having anything
against environmental experts,

those are the messages
that are reaching people.

And they are overwhelming.

They awake hearts.

We have now grown.

We are even more weirdos,
because we are working with technology

not so available in the current media,

and we have a partnership
with a few agencies

like the United Nations and
other organizations

that help us with the budget
so that we can travel

throughout Latin America and the Caribbean

looking for these stories.

I will show you how we work.

(Music)

(Water flowing)

[Environment]

[Biodiversity]

[Quality of life]

[Climate Change]

[Culture]

[Social Reality]

[TV and radio programs]

[Documentary features]

[Educational spots]

[Media network]
[More than 60 TV channels]

[Radios, Internet] [70 million
of potential viewers]

(Snapshots)

[Photography exhibitions]

[Articles and photo features]

[Children's books]

[We help to the sustainable development
of Latin America and the Caribbean]

[increasing environmental
and social consciousness for change]

[We produce high-quality,
educational material]

[that is distributed at no cost
throughout the region]

Let's conclude.

There are signs of change
today in Latin America

that say that it is possible
to face people's indifference.

That, in fact, this is our worst enemy.

Thank you very much.

(Applause)