Wetlands for LiFE: A Series of Film Festivals & Media Initiatives

"Wetlands for LiFE" is a citizen engagement initiative focused on raising awareness and inspiring action for wetland conservation through storytelling and participatory approaches such as Film Festivals, Media consultation & media student engagement programmes. Launched on World Wetlands Day 2024 by Dr. Musonda Mumba, Secretary General of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, the program directly engaged 5,405 youth, filmmakers, environmentalists, and civil society and government actors. It reached over 63,000 people digitally, screened more than 160 films, trained 168 future filmmakers in social impact storytelling using mobile devices, and enrolled 469 Wetland Mitras across eight major Indian cities.

Organized by the Centre for Media Studies (CMS), this initiative was part of the "Wetlands Management for Biodiversity and Climate Protection" project, implemented by GIZ on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection (BMUV), with support from the International Climate Initiative (IKI), in partnership with the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC). The project combined film festivals, media engagement, and capacity-building efforts to drive a collective movement for the preservation and sustainable management of wetlands.