Making it a veritable playground for kids but a potentially deadly one. To binny where voodoo is a state religion many are helped by it but children often suffer from its decreased but first lets look at the humble banana the most popular fruit in the world could it soon be wiped out. In one way germany is certainly of that minaret public its citizens twelve kilograms of the yellow fruit every year on average americans are the only nationality to consume more in twenty sixteen around one hundred thirteen million tons of bananas were harvested worldwide but the vast majority of them were from a single cloned variety the cavendish. Huge monocultures are an open invitation to pests and pathogens one of them a soil fungus called t. R. Four has spread rapidly inside. And caused major damage in many countries there and for is far from the only destructive fungus experts have long said the days of the cavendish are numbered and thats causing major concern in ecuador. Or the countrys number one export. You know theres not an airport ahead this sign is warning drivers about low flying aircraft spraying banana fields in southern ecuador with fungus sides as a preventive measure they make their runs two or three times a week their target is black sea good talk a fungus that is to bananas what bubonic plague once was to humans Darwin Palacios owns four conventional nonorganic banana plantations its a Family Business and they dont know where. To go talk to its not a disease you can eradicate you have to learn how to live with it it will always be there. Its a fungus that thrives under these favorable humid conditions all we can do is carry out regular checks to make sure there isnt an outbreak that will damage the non across that. And make sure that it leaves on the fruit stay healthy. Once the fungus has taken hold its hard to fight ecuador has been mainly spared so far due to its climate nothing is humid and rainy as Central America for example where fungus side is needed three times as often bananas are propagated asexually from off shoots the main plant produces smaller shoots at its base theyre removed and transplanted generally the young shoots bear fruit within nine months. I mean we can select the best plants but we actually get them cloned in the laboratory so they have the same genetic properties. That guarantees that we always get the best possible fruit the best clusters with the highest weight. So we get the best production of. That. But a sexual reproduction has a major risk the plant is no longer able to genetically adapt and that makes it vulnerable to natural enemies. Practically all the bananas eaten around the world are the fruit of a single culture of our the cavendish and unfortunately its not resistant to blacks a good talker. The fungus sides being sprayed here dont pose a health risk to consumers but they do to plantation workers organic bananas are an increasingly important sector making up ten percent of total production for ghana growers are taking a new approach like here in el pinko agronomist gonzalo marks pinout it was exposed to farming chemicals for three years he worked for a pesticide wholesaler until he got sick. I worked for a company that sold farming products like pesticides and so forth i had to work on the fields that were being sprayed by the airplanes thats how i got sick first decide use makes the plantation workers sick. Once theyve reached a certain age they lose their nails they get cancer. They lose their hair and their eyesight. Its all too much. Its hard to get official figures on Health Problems caused by pesticides but in this region everyone seems to know someone whos gotten sick. The organic plantations only use natural substances like manure bacterial extracts algae extract and oils that may help slow the growth of pests like the cedar took a fungus i dont know if youve got it on a conventional plantation you can go walking at night and you wont encounter anything on the ground on an organic farm youll find weeds worms ants and all kinds of different insects. Ecuador is undergoing some changes after the country switched its currency to the u. S. Dollar in two thousand the economy made a modest recovery and thats also encouraged a new ecological way of thinking on his farm Darwin Palacios has standardized his production. The yields in the various parts of the farm are systematically monitored that help apply fertilizer water and pesticides more efficiently and in the process he can save money. Here we get all kinds of information about the harvested trees the most Important Information is there white. We can also determine the age of the plant where the fruit came from. And using that information we can see if something is wrong with that section. And we can intervene and improve things if necessary. Then the fruit is prepared for shipment from my child to europe. The bananas are still green when theyre sent off ripening will be initiated using ethylene gas once theyve reached their destination but Research Continues the goal is to breed plants that are completely resistant to the fungus. From the sides will then become unnecessary at least until the next pathogen strikes the plantations. Leaving Science Behind so lets consider matters of a more spiritual nature practices may vary but millions of people around the planet are united by a belief in something otherworldly take crop circles for example some see them as supernatural phenomena others as messages from extra terrestrials. Get russia a third of the population believes in astrology the nation as a whole spends an estimated twenty two Million Euros a year on spiritual servicers. The isle time mountains. This is where russia borders mongolia kazakhstan and china. Its a destination for generations of pilgrims. That come from miles around seeking spiritual guidance. Legend has it that this is a place to embark on a path of interchange. Where the most involved the wideout meet the locals say that if you think out loud on president you saw us coming on the way to avoid the phone yeah its important to remind yourself of that and spiritual places like these i miss the feeling of that but i dont get this occurs here call themselves modern pilgrims if theyre drawn to yoga healing rituals and self worry. Yet in a goal may you not leads groups of stressed out city dwellers to the. You know thats what. I was here a year ago all my wishes were fulfilled i came to relax but also to find miracles that you son is all the clothes that all of them. Leads the visitors to the icons of the village monastery. The confluence of these two rivers is the place to wish for a spouse. And you hear what i see i think we russians in particular were always on a search for meaning thats the way we are i remember being a small child in the soviet union wolf and one of my relatives went to hilo with that kind of thing was normal and the one thing i knew theres even one guillotine. In a village in southwestern russia navea meghan all of us says women like her used to be burned at the stake but nowadays doctors be for their patients to her. Shes known locally as the bush got the village matriarch at ninety offers treatments with water wax and prayers. But she only receives people who have been baptized. More to knew what he was really scared youre not scared anymore. Everyone comes to me ritual it wouldnt even help feeling if people are afraid i dont hear of a lot of the light against the evil eye sore throat bad skin inflammation you. One of. Hundreds of kilometers away from not israel it is another place where people arrive from moscow and beyond hoping for miracles. Stars eva doesnt have it easy her husband recently committed suicide alcohol was involved and jealousy she has additional problems. Im scared about what the doctors say about some dark spots on my lungs and i want to know how my children are doing i have a lot of children i worry about them. Thousands of people have sought help from vibing petrovich over the years he tells my dead that the cross is formed by the matches floating in the water symbolize the burden of life. He prophesies as an illness and her daughter and says he sees the shadows in the dead as logs. Petrovich predicts a new man will soon enter her life then he tells her to drink the water that hes blessed payment is optional people give what they can. But i do my best to cleanse away all the negative energy so i was hoping fewer people would make their way here actually more and more coming. In the former soviet union belief in the supernatural was an open secret the psychokinetic experiments involving gina who claimed to have psychic powers were watched by the government in the one thousand nine hundred. Shortly before the soviet union collapsed a salt professed psychic named anatoly cuspidor ski appeared on t. V. To conduct a mass healing sessions to millions throughout the soviet block. And the face here junot really was sought by many in the politburo her famous patients included soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev and later president boris yeltsin. Nearly thirty years later countless Healing Services online represent a major enterprise. The patriarch of the Russian Orthodox church considers president Vladimir Putins rise to power a miracle of god he also foresees an impending apocalypse. Its not uncommon for a Police Officer to ask a priest to bless the sites of numerous Car Accidents jesus has become an antidote for misfortune. Sociologists point to depression anxiety and a disoriented society as an explanation for the rising belief in magical thinking. No idea whats going to happen in the near future and they plan their lives from your paycheck to the next maybe a few months of. Work from this that are. Back in the other time mantons the spiritual guide yelena got mail insists healers are more than a rural phenomena she says her clients from moscow couldnt get by without people like her. In a country where reality is a painful experience for Many Russians cope by hoping for miracles. Russians arent the only ones who believe in higher powers so do people who practice voodoo an ancient religion rooted in western africa. Believe first pray to a supreme being and around four hundred other spheres. Its like the gods a vendor or water. The nina is considered the cradle of hoodoo in the sixteenth century the religion spread to the americas with the slave trade particularly brazil haiti the Dominican Republic and the u. S. State of louisiana. Who has around sixty million adherents worldwide in between around one in five people hold the belief but some of the practices common in voodoo are highly controversial. Performing a dance for the thunder god. She is among the few villagers to master the dance she learned it was she was confined to a voodoo convent. It was an agonizing three years in which she had no contact with the outside world. The worst thing was not seeing my family. You know and there was no proper place to go to the toilet or to wash. And i was often not enough to eat and we were constantly hungry. And their chief lives in a small Village People here believe in voodoo and in the practice of confining children in convents in order to heal their illnesses and drive evil spirits out of their bodies one hundred she was eight years old she suffered from frequent stomach pains and a high fever a mother brought her to the hospital but the doctors there were unable to help the village priest advice sending her to the voodoo convent for twenty years of almost complete isolation in their home i knew that my daughter would suffer under the conditions there thats not enough to eat here on the outside i have enough food but i wasnt allowed to bring anything to her in the convent. She shows us the way from her home back to the convent the place of painful memories lies in the center of the village just metres away from her house but for three years she lived behind this fence in another world inaccessible to her family. And yet she brings us to the fortune teller who she visited when she was sick back then it was a village oracle who decided her fate. Here and. The article said that the thunder god had to be appeased in order to heal and. According to local beliefs that meant years of isolation. Children sent to the convent do not go to school during that time instead they spend their days praying dancing and learning a voodoo language. Though i was healed within three months by the prayers the herbs and the leaves but i still had to stay. Here for three long years during which time she also had to have the tribe symbol cut into her face. Well way they made the markings with a razor blade it really hurt these are the signs of the thunder god. And the little. Like the ones on these boys chests many children are marked with scars the cutting is a traditional element of beliefs and part of many rituals. Play a role in this ceremony too although the children do not actually hurt themselves. This group of children are being released today after having been confined for years in one of bennys thousands of voodoo commons attitudes are changing but only gradually Aid Organizations were able to convince central bendings high priest to sign an agreement limiting the time that children would have to stay in the convent to a maximum of three months. In the new arrangement allows the children to go to school i myself cannot read and write so its very awkward when i have an official meeting i think its important for children to go to school. With. Several hundred priests and local government officials have signed the agreement that enabled the release of more than one thousand children last year who have returned to their families and to school. But while the time spent in the convent has been shortened the practice has yet to be abolished completely. While filming we witness how a seven Year Old Girl with severe stomach pains consults the oracle and the voodoo high priest. She unctuously awaits their decision. Then the judgement that three months isolation in the convent in order to heal her. Without even being able to say goodbye to her parents she has brought to the convent directly to the sacrificial altar of the earth god. The girl needs a lot of time to calm down while the priest say prays and brings initial offerings for the earth god. From there the girl is brought to the small mud hut where she has to spend the next three months. Meanwhile is back in school but readjusting to normal life was not easy. To do first i didnt recognize my friends. It was so embarrassing after missing three years she still has trouble keeping up but she does still have four years of schooling ahead of a chance to make up for all that precious time she lost while in the convent. Excuse. In many parts of the world the carefree days of childhood include spending warm days in a Swimming Pool river or lake that makes it easy to forget that swimming is not an innate skill. For a billion people around the globe are unable to swim thats more than half the worlds population droning is one of the most common causes of accidental death every minute on average two people somewhere in the world will drown. My jetta begum treasures had daughters close. One month ago six year old ayyash drowned near their village. She was such a Good Daughter she was always helping me. Everyone loved her. I sure would have loved to have had an education. I asked his older sister first ana is a great comfort to her mother she misses her sister every day. His school did everything together we walked to school played together afterwards and ate together. One fifth of bangladesh is just a metre above sea level but many here cannot swim the statistics are shocking fifty children drown every day in the south asian country these children have learned to swim and have a lot of fun splashing about just a stones throw from their homes most villages are situated on pools like this one they used as laundry bathing area and playground. I learned to swim last month its great in the water so nice and cool. Before i could swim i was afraid of the water. Now its found. That i had the sixty. Children who cant swim can only watch from the bank they need to be careful its very easy to slip in the mud and fall in. A. Four year old ruby all says that he cannot swim but definitely wants to learn finale he only baits where shallow fasano has set off for the next village with her mother today there are swimming lessons taking place there first on a knows how to swim and now she wants to become a swimming teacher. So shes helping the instructor. Learning how to swim its really important for us kids many die as my sister did because they cant swim. So i. Dont need. To match what has been schumi is giving me lessons in this mostly Muslim Country female teachers arent a common sight had training is financed by a British Organization which has helped to set out more than one hundred courses in bangladesh. About somebody. Im in the twelfth grade them are you happy about it. Finally after practicing on dry land its time to hit the water here in bangladesh women swim fully clothed a special bamboo practice area has been constructed for beginners theres a floor so that no one can slip and go under. His mothers still understandably nervous thousand are in the teacher trying to help the children overcome their fear of the water. Actually shes still young and quite shy but shell soon get better at it if shes determined shell be a good instructor but perhaps even better than me well its a hope. They practice swimming two hours every day then they head home to help out with the chills almost all of the children can swim after five days according to the Aid Organization that organizes the courses only. Give children in bangladesh all too often of diarrhea cholera malaria meningitis another diseases but eighteen thousand children also died by drowning we have to do something about the. Darkness is falling on her and her family are eating dinner they missed desperately. And both children should learn how to swim then they wouldnt drown like my youngest daughter did its so important. For. The friend. Feels the same the tragic loss of her sister means above all that she wants to help others stay safe. Thats it from global three thousand this time around would you think let us know send us an email and check out our Facebook Page d w Global Society were back again next week. Prosperity optimism thats the power of global trite global three thousand. By d. H. L. The book. The book. The book. From the Pacific Ocean to the atlantic. Not on but along the panama canal. A train trip to remember. With spectacular views. Across a continent. On the. Other boulder to go travelling by train in panama. Its called details. Happy birthday in good shape returning ten this year and you came with this Amazing Fitness backpack and if you want to know whats inside its visit on the web and born. To turn in the most favorite homeland isnt like golfing or maybe the world that actually has to do so for. Good luck. To be created movie milestone. It was an instrument of propaganda and persecution. It underwent bankruptcy and restructuring. But its still turning out films today. Germanys biggest and oldest film company. Cinematic history from the german empire to the present. The pioneers the visionary and the business of. One hundred here so far starting february eighteenth on. This you know i mean a million minutes he. Goes oh no theres cynical media. Us all up with only about a. Vision of getting. It on what it. What im focused on and the sort of but im. Not sure i notice at them this you know i mean when youre not in a scene going you know. Sort of a moment to notice. I mean im going to end unanimous. The show could go because as youve said. I shouldnt quote ive only said that i caught going on what theyre doing finding quinto point i can see it because i see if i say i said. This is d w news live from berlin political or arrest or abduction this is the dramatic scene out of restaurants in kiev as Border Police to board Opposition LeaderMikhail Saakashvili ukraine says he was in the country illegally saakashvili is calling the move a kidnapping will go to the ukrainian capital also coming up. A power struggle in south africa the countrys a. N. C. Is pushing president jacob zuma to step down but will the scandal tainted leader comply