Production in 2004

Auctioning Wildlife Animals in South Africa
  ～Can Invisible Hand Save Our Nature?～
 

Broadcast: November 13, 2004 10:10-11:00p.m.
Project initiated, directed, and produced by Hiroshi MASUDA Assistant Director: Kumiko NAKAJIMA Producer: Kazuo MATSUI Production Manager: Toshiro SOGA

 Every year in South Africa are held very unique auctions to sell off wildlife animals just taken from savanna; lions, buffaloes, giraffes, etc. The biggest auction held in June gains as much as 300 million US Dollars just in one day by selling 2,000 animals of 20 species. Some might suspect it is a story of underground business including poaching and smuggling, but reality is that these auctions are not only legitimate, fair and square business fields, but also play important role in the wildlife conservation policy.

In every nation in the world, it is an important and difficult question how to conserve wildlife and realize coexistence with human. The common method is to regulate hunting and other utilization of wildlife that are possessed by nobody or solely by the state, which is perceived as the major premise. But in South Africa, there has been a Copernican change to start conservation by allowing privatization of wild animals. This change has resulted in drastically improved conservation and also boosting wildlife industry. So, what's wrong with this new policy, producing better conservation and more money?

But where is the "wild"life going? The program will explore the changing "wild" world, by following the process of wildlife animals getting counted, enlisted, captured, translocated, sold at an auction, and their fate afterward, and by focusing also on the activities of industries and people working on the process.

America ― Heartland and Soul

Now it is on NHK TV on irregular schedule. To get the latest on-air schedule, please go to their websitehttp://www.nhk.or.jp/ in Japanese and search with Japanese program title, because unfortunately there seems to be no search function in English.   Project Design and Chief Director: Hiroshi MASUDA Chief Producer: Yoshio UCHIDA General Producer: Toshiro SOGA Executive Producer: Shigeru MURAI, Hironao IMAZU (Evergreen Digital Contents, Inc.) Assistant Producer: Yoko SORATA, Hisahiro KAWANO Coordination and facilitation: Noriko TAKAMATSU, Jordan KRAFT Copyright Arrangement: Elke TITUS, Shizuko AMANO Director: Hiroshi MASUDA, Yuri OSUGI, Koji HAYASAKI, Mitsuhiro HARAGUCHI

 An unprecedented travelogue project to portray this big nation is under way taking two years, and to complete soon. The program consists of fifty episodes with each destination around the States, starting from Plymouth, MA, where the first steps were made by the Pilgrim fathers, and reaching Fairbanks, AK, as the last frontier. Format: 50 episodes, 10 min. each episode, Japanese version, HDTV NTSC (Please inquire for other formats and languages).

The Volume titles, fifty destinations, states, and contents:

Where it All Started             -New England-   Plymouth MA Arrival of the Mayflower   Boston MA Midnight Ride for Independence   Concord MA Lights Reflecting on the Walden Pond   Newport RI America's First Resort   New Haven CT A Birthplace of the Hamburger Fields of Dreams                 -New York-   Ellis Island NY The Tiny Island that Saw Millions of Hopes   Manhattan NY Driving through Broadway   Wall Street NY The Capital of Money   Cooperstown NY The First "Play ball!"   Niagara NY Waterfall for Two How to Build a Great Nation  -Pennsylvania and Washington D.C.-   Philadelphia/   Gettysburg PA For Whom the Liberty Bell Tolled?   Pittsburg PA Carnegie and the Steel City   Washington D.C./   Arlington DC/VA They Are Silent but Eloquent   Smithsonian DC The Largest Collection in the World   Mount Vernon/   Monticello VA The Hometown of Founding Fathers Deep into the Soul of America  -The South-   Charleston SC Where the Old South Still Lives   Atlanta GA Gone with the Wind, Came with Coke   Montgomery AL A Small Bus that Changed America   Tuscumbia AL Hometown of Helen Keller   Charlotte NC A Center for Born Again Christians High Beyond the Sky        -Florida and Caribbean sea-   Kill Devil Hills NC Wright Brothers' Dream   Cape Canaveral FL Gateway to the Universe   Everglades FL The Great Wetland   Key West FL The Old Writer and the Sea   Puerto Rico   America in the Caribbean Sea Down by the Riverside-The Mississippi-   New Orleans LA Back O'Town, Small Pieces for Jazz   Memphis TN Birthplace of Rock'n Roll   Nashville TN Capital of Country Music   Hannibal MO Remember when you were a Tom Sawyer?   Chicago IL Roaring 20's and Chicago Blues Over the Horizon -Great Lakes and Plains-   Detroit MI The Invention that Changed the World   Milwaukee WI Harley-Davidson was Born   DeSmet SD Only Yesterday with the Ingalls Family   Black Hills SD/WY What America is to the Native Americans   Yellowstone WY/ID/MT The First National Park in the World Frontier Spirit Forever     -Texas-   The Alamo TX Prototype of "Remember and ..."   Dallas TX City of Cowboys   Houston TX Oil Capital of America   King Ranch TX Big Family on a Big Ranch   El Paso TX Hispanic Power Wild, Wild West        -Arizona and New Mexico-   Monument Valley UT/AZ The Scenery of America   Grand Canyon AZ Wonder of the Earth   Las Vegas NV The City of Desire   Trinity Site NM The Explosion that Changed the World Forever   Santa Fe NM Still Life in Adobe New Wave, Big Wave  -West Coast and Alaska-   Hollywood CA Dreams for a Nickel   San Francisco CA Where Have All the Flower Children Gone?   Napa/Sonoma CA Valleys of Vine and Wine   Seattle WA The Entrepreneurs: Boeing and Microsoft   Fairbanks AK The Last Frontier under Northern Lights