It's Our World, Our Future Too: Young People's Voices on Environment and Health Priorities

In the film, youth from Russia, Belgium, Hungary and the United Kingdom (UK) describe how the damaged and deprived physical surroundings in which they live are affecting their health. The youth are encouraged to make suggestions about how they themselves and their political representatives can change the situation and bring about a better quality of life.

The idea was based on an earlier project by young people in the UK that was supported by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. The developers believe that using video gave the children an opportunity to express themselves in a way that allowed them to be spontaneous and creative, and to have fun. The film has subsequently been shown at European Union (EU) regional meetings and in a variety of public forums. It was first shown at the Fourth Ministerial Conference on Environment and Health in Budapest in June 2004 - attended by over 1,000 representatives from 52 European countries. At that time some of the children appearing in the video were also able to attend the conference, and during a parallel event, they had an opportunity to speak to the then EU Environment Commissioner, Margot Wallström. One participant from the UK asked her whether the video would make any difference to her. Wallström replied that she took the messages seriously and would seek to champion the issues in her work.

During the Budapest visit, the participants also had an opportunity to meet Hungarians of their own age, to talk to them about local problems and to film them, leading to the creation of an additional segment. Since then, the entire video has been shown to several key meetings of European environment and health politicians and policy makers in Brussels.

The next step for the developers is to make the video widely available to policy makers, NGOs and others working with young people. Copies are available free of charge from the HEAL secretariat (please see contact details, below). A booklet to accompany the video has been produced and is available in PDF format by clicking here.

The concerns expressed by the more than 30 children featured varied from country to country. In Hungary and Russia, the main problems are air pollution, traffic noise and dumping of waste. In Belgium, a class of school children focused on the smells from factories and crop spraying. In the UK, most complaints relate to drugs, violence and graffiti. Some key quotes from the film include:

Russia
"With all the factories in Moscow, children are already ill when they are born - even if their parents are healthy. I am in this category of children and have a permanent cold because I live in the Moscow district."
- Alina Bezenhar

Belgium
"Opposite our house is a pig farm that sometimes smells so bad that we all have to shut our windows. When the farmer fertilizes his land, it sinks."
- Andy Bleyen

Hungary
"Near to our living area there's a cement factory where used tyres were burned to generate energy. Fortunately, a filter system was installed recently… and they planted trees around the site, too. It's a great improvement… I noticed that the wildlife in our area revived."
- Ern Balogh

UK
"There's too many gangs around here and they destroy everything."
- James, who was interviewed on the Gascoigne housing estate