Charles Annenberg Weingarten: Citizen Reporter

With World Food Day approaching on the 16th, I started thinking — not about world hunger, but rather about how cultures approach food so differently.

Globalization has brought a lot of changes, especially in the world of food: pineapples in the dead of a Michigan winter, Belgian chocolates in Goa, peanut butter in sub-Saharan Africa. And that's just on the surface; I won't even get into the deeper economic impact of the global food trade.

But there are still some cultures that have maintained a strong mono-culinary tradition, partly because of geographic isolation, but in part of the connections it has with their history and culture.

Way, way up north, in the deep Arctic territory of Nunavut, Canada, and parts of Greenland, for example, the Inuit people still eat caribou, seal, walrus, and whale — the very animals they used to hunt in the backcountry, but don't ...read full post

In honor of the World Water Week gathering in Stockholm, Sweden, explore has put together a short compilation of videos from our library that highlight water-related issues in India, China, Costa Rica, and the Arctic.

Now that The Cove - the documentary about dolphin slaughtering in Japan - has officially rolled out to most U.S. cities, people's awareness about dolphins' precarious position on this planet has risen to new levels.

Films like this are incredible in that they can literally shock viewers into action - and it has certainly worked. As one reviewer wrote, "Rarely does an investigative documentary have such immediate impact that it results in observable change," referring to the claim that the movie is responsible for mercury-tainted dolphin flesh being taken out of school lunch menus in Japan. 

What we like most about The Cove, though, is that it turned people's minds and hearts back to the dolphins - a species that has enchanted us for years. There are so many fascinating things about these highly social and intelligent creatures, from the ...read full post

China's economy is developing at a breakneck speed, with coal-fired power plants working round the clock to provide the energy for growth, releasing huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Experts predict that China, now the world's largest emitter of CO2, will produce even more in years to come.

Wen Bo, a leading Chinese environmentalist, sheds light on his approach to raising environmental awareness in his home country.

On a trip to Rwanda, we were fortunate to have as our guide Craig Sholley, a Senior Director of the African Wildlife Foundation, who has been intimately involved in the preservation of African wildlife for more than 30 years.

Watch the video, Gorillas...98.6% Human to see our incredible encounters with four families of wild mountain gorillas, a species with only 720 remaining members. 

We all know that many organic grocers in the US have identified some great fair-trade and pesticide-free suppliers overseas, Whole Foods being one of them. But did you know that they get their bananas from a university farm in Costa Rica?

So not only are they high-quality bananas, produced with minimal social and environmental impact, but students are learning to perfect their techniques by working on the on-campus banana farm!

See the short video clip below, and if you want to know more about EARTH University, here is the entire documentary.

We also got the chance to get some more insight from ...read full post

On a trip to Ranthambore National Park in northern India, I was able to speak with Belinda Wright, longtime conservationist and champion of tigers in India.

One thing she said really stuck with me - that there "doesn't seem to be much space in modern India for tigers." By that, she meant that humans looking to develop more land are encroaching on the Bengal tiger's natural habitat, ironically endangering their own fresh water sources.

Hear more about the crucial situation of the Bengal tiger in India in this documentary short from explore.org.

In Part I of a two-part series, I speak with environmental lawyer M.C. Mehta about India's problems: acid rain causing the Taj Mahal to turn yellow, cities choked with congestion and car exhaust, and the slow death of the Ganges River from pollution.

Continue watching the interview on explore.org - M.C. Mehta 2.