Official Competition: International Festival of Environmental Film Festival 2016
WATCH IT NOW: www.troubled-waters.net

While more than half of the world’s population now lives close to marine environments, we rely heavily on the seas for their natural resources including food, transport and recreation.

However, we also use it as a convenient dumping ground for domestic and industrial waste, both directly and via river and atmospheric inputs, leading to important negative ecological and economic impacts.

Given the cross-sectorial nature of this issue and the fact that the way we produce and deal with waste reflects our social and economic paradigms, marine litter is a complex problem, where responsibilities are often unclear and the burden of costs unequally divided. This is clearly an example of a problem that does not have any one-size-fits-all solution but requires an integrated approach which 15 European partners (Research labs, NGOs & consumer organizations) have decided to tackle together.

As part of the MARLISCO (MARine Litter in European Seas: Social AwarenesS and CO-Responsibility) European project, the webdocumentary will aim at exploring the solutions and confront the audience to its own role in addressing this complex issue.

Synopsis
634,000 kilograms of waste are dumped into the oceans each second, 20 billion tonnes per year, of which 80% come from land! Well, what can we do?

We cannot hide from the fact that this enormous amount of waste littering the bottom of our seas and oceans come from us, from our actions as well as our inactions. What steps can we take to curb this scourge, and how can we find real solutions in our practices and laws to better manage our waste?

Troubled Waters questions us, we Europeans, on our ability to change our behaviour towards waste. For two years, filmmaker Isabelle Sylvestre travelled across Europe in order to meet different groups and individuals who are all part of the waste management system. From the door-to-door service to explain recycling, to the large “indecision” of our national and European politics; from the management of “green” ports, or the visit to a very special school of young fishermen, to the emergence of collective good practices, and the impact of the economic crisis on waste management, Isabelle Sylvestre encountered Europeans, who in their own way, try to change things – or not.

About

Interview Request / General Information:
Isabelle Sylvestre, Author and Director – isasylvestre@yahoo.fr – Tel : +33 6 28 06 85 23
Sarah Trévillard, Honkytonk Films – sarah.trevillard@honkytonk.fr – Tel: +33 1 83 64 55 20