The INFO Project Blog

As a longtime fan of her work, I was excited to learn that Jessica Mayberry’s Video Volunteers brigade has been selected to participate in America’s Giving Challenge, an online fundraising competition sponsored by Global Giving and Parade Magazine. The top four organizations that receive the highest number of contributors will receive $50,000 grants.

Since their launch in June 2006, Video Volunteers Community Video Units have been inspiring community members across India to speak out for social change. VV trains marginalized community members as paid Community Video Producers. Each month, the producers make new local-language Video Magazines on a different social issue. The programs are screened them in slums and villages on widescreen projectors to up to 10,000 people.

VV’s site tells stories of the remarkable impact of this innovative communication model, including:

• Doctors started attending patients in four villages after villagers were informed it was their right to have a doctor present in the clinic every day
• A group of five villagers from different castes decided to organize a dinner where they would eat together as a symbolic gesture against caste

Organizations like Population Services International (PSI) have measured the impact of Mobile Film Unitsin Bangladesh and India of showing educational documentaries on family planning, child survival, and AIDS prevention, often in the form of a soap opera or puppet show. During breaks, promoters hand out sample oral contraceptive pills, oral rehydration salts, or condoms.

Upcoming issues of Population Reports and INFO Reports will focus on the impact of behavior change communication, including Mobile Film Units.