Video Volunteers (VV) runs India's only reporting network that's focused exclusively on providing broad coverage from the poorest, most media-dark districts in India. We currently have 206 individuals trained across India's most diverse and marginalised communities, who all earn a living as a VV Community Correspondent (CC). Our goal is to grow our network to a minimum of 350 CC's, which will ensure that India's poorest and most conflict-ridden districts have a video producer and news outlet.
Mainstream media in the developing world doesn't give the poor the information they need, and it largely excludes their voices from its dialogue. Widespread illiteracy (30% in India) bars the utility of print publications (which also generally fail to address issues relevant to the poor), and often there is no TV. The internet - the great equalizer in the West - also requires literacy. Without information, the poor have no way to fight corruption or hold local elected officials accountable.
Our initiatives empower marginalized communities with an articulate voice to come up with their own solutions to their problems, create platforms for community discussion and create sustainable business models for CC's to function as news stringers. VV diversifies the media by training the most excluded to produce professional media.
Since 2010, VV Community Correspondents have produced more than 4000 videos, 25% of which have manged to solve the problem the video addressed including, 1100 corruption and poor governance issues, bringing a concrete benefit to more than 3.7 million people. By expanding our network of community video producers, we can give a voice to hundreds more communities in the developing world and democratize the media.
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).
