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We are thrilled to share with you our latest news updates. From being part of a historical meeting of the entire Hadzabe tribe to winning a major Impact Campaign award at the 2025 Jackson Wild Summit, our team has barely been in the office for the last two months. Just to make sure you don’t miss any of these remarkable adventures, we’ve packed them all in. Read through and find out.

We were honoured to have two of our films nominated as finalists for the Jackson Wild Media Awards 2025. Our film Ts’ikayo & Duduk’we: An Original Myth from Hadzabe People was nominated for a branded content award while Chameleon Corridors was nominated for two awards: People and Nature (Short form Category) and Best Impact Campaign.

We are grateful to our Impact Producer and Programs Director Simona Nickmanova and our founder Jigar Ganatra, who both represented us at the 2025 Jackson Wild Summit. Together they pitched our Chameleon Corridors Impact Campaign and won the Jackson Wild X Earth Alliance Impact Campaign Award, which came with a $30,000 USD grant.

This is a major victory for the Eastern Arc Mountains, an often forgotten biodiversity hotspot in Tanzania, giving a tremendous boost to the vital work of  protecting the incredible, unique species found nowhere else.

We extend our appreciations to our Impact campaign partners PAMS foundation, My World Film Grant, Amberjack films, GreenManjaro Foundation, Nomad Tanzania, the Jane Goodall Institute, Roots and Shoots Tanzania, the Tanzania Forest Service, Global Impact Producer Alliance, and our amazing film crew, and especially the dedicated local community members in the Eastern Arc Mountains who are protecting this special landscape. Your support is the fuel for this mission.

Join us in protecting the Eastern Arc Mountains, learn more on how you can support and become our official Impact Campaign partner.

In late August, AFRISOS was invited to be a part of a 6 day general meeting organized by the Hadzabe held at Umbeya, on their ancestral territory. This was the first time that more than 400 Hadzabe community members from 5 different regions in Tanzania have come together to discuss pressing issues from land rights, preservation of their traditions and language, and addressing exploitative tourism.

AFRISOS together with other organizations who are partnered with the Hadza including Dorobo Fund, Ujamaa Community Resource Team (UCRT) and Carbon Tanzania were invited to strengthen our allyship and help represent their needs and messages to the wider world. 

Among the most urgent issues, the community highlighted the need to counter the viral videos that are being circulated about them online which misrepresent their culture and humiliate them. They are more determined, now more than ever, to correct these messages and share a truer version of their unique culture.

AFRISOS got the opportunity to screen the short films and photo stories made by the Hadzabe storytellers during the last 3 photography and filmmaking workshops we have run. 

During the 6 day meeting, a new portraiture project to preserve the memory of Hadzabe lineage was launched, where Hadza photographers in collaboration with AFRISOS took the opportunity to capture a portrait of every Hadza community member in attendance. These photos were printed and given to each individual photographed and a copy of them will be stored in the Hadzabe Media Center where the collection will be used as a living library owned by the community. The Hadzabe in attendance also got the opportunity to enjoy film recordings and photographs made of them almost 100 years ago by Ludwig Kohl-Larsen graciously brought to Tanzania from archives in Germany by Annete Wagner, a journalist who worked with the community 25 years ago.

As we approached Wildscreen Botswana 2025, The Wilderness project, together with AFRISOS held a six-day Expedition Filmmaking Workshop in Okavango Delta Botswana, with the on-ground support from Nkashibw.

This all-expenses-paid workshop was designed to push the mentees to their creative limits, with only three days to shoot and two days to edit and deliver a 90 second character driven story. 

The mentees, Wrightwel Nyirenda (Zambia), Pauline Kyalo (Kenya), Basezana Monyamane (Botswana), Hamis Salehe (Tanzania) and Rufusiah Molefe (Botswana), went above and beyond. They rose up to the challenge under the mentorship of outstanding cinematographer, Johann Vorster, Award winning filmmaker, Jigar Ganatra, Film & Impact Power house, Simona Nickmanova and the acclaimed editor & post production guru, Tebogo Phalane.

To the end of the workshop, the mentees created five amazing films that were later screened at the Wildscreen, giving a chance for each mentee to speak about their film to professionals and people passionate about the natural world storytelling.

Interested to watch their films? Click the button below.

If you’d like to support our mission and help us continue empowering young storytellers across Africa, please donate or reach out to us at hello@afrisos.ngo to find out how to get involved.

Warmly,

The AFRISOS Team