Behind the Lens: Finding Hope in the Field
Giacomo Pirozzi is an Italy-based freelance photographer who, for the past two decades, has travelled the world taking photos for UN agencies including UNDP, UNICEF and UNAIDS. He has been to over 100 countries, 51 of them in Africa. Among his many assignments, he has documented the Rwandan genocide, civil wars in Angola, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Somalia, the 2004 Asian tsunami and the 2005 Pakistan earthquake. However, he says it is the positive stories that he enjoys the most. Between April and May, he spent two weeks in Benin and Burkina Faso documenting the various UNDP programmes at work there, including the Multi-Functional Platform.
“The atmosphere of the Sahel is magical. It’s magical in terms of landscape, the big Baobab trees, the kind of light you see. It’s one of the best parts of Africa. I like the colours, the people, the culture. And the Burkinabé, they are very well known for being peaceful and very hospitable. It’s a country where you can feel very easy when you get there.
There is a lot happening in the field in Africa that the media doesn’t focus on. In Benin, UNDP is supporting the regional parliament to improve its management. As part of this initiative, some of the parliamentarians are travelling the country and talking to communities. They sit for a day in the community and discuss issues with people, especially those related to land. One of the biggest problems in many African countries is the inheritance issue. Women can’t inherit land. Before, they feared speaking up about it, especially to the authorities. But now they are quite outspoken, which is great in a country that is trying to be more democratic. It’s a start and it’s a beautiful thing that I’ve never seen before.
With my work I try to focus more and more on the positive. I’ve done a lot of work in southern Africa and we all know, looking at the numbers, especially of HIV rates, that the situation is difficult, but when you go work with the communities there is a lot of good stuff going on. If you look at the communities and the involvement of everyday people, that gives hope to people like us in the field.”