Changing World; Tanzania: The Quiet Revolution. Reel 1

Item Information

Title:
Changing World; Tanzania: The Quiet Revolution. Reel 1
Description:
As nations go, Tanzania is in its infancy. It was born in April 1964 of a union of Tanganyika, a former British colony, and Zanzibar, tiny islands off the East Coast of Africa which were formerly Arab dominated. This program explores many of the problems facing this struggling nation - poverty, sickness, education, and lack of trained manpower. Beyond this, the program focuses on Tanzania's policy of non-alignment in the Cold War and its willing acceptance of foreign aid from both Free World and Communist Bloc countries. A program portrait of Tanzania reveals that it is the biggest East African nation with a population of about 10 million. Its poverty is visible in the savannahs, arid dry plains that account for about a third of the country's land area. It is on these plains where famine and pestilence strike about every four to six years, where wealth is measured in cattle, and where the people continue to barter, subsisting virtually without money. Tanzania is principally an agricultural nation with the bulk of its produce in coffee, cotton, cloves, and sisal, a plant used for hard fiber cordage. The head of Tanzania's government is President Julius K. Nyerere, an imaginative innovator and champion of his country's non-alignment policy. He envisions his country as a young nation with big problems. He favors an African socialism that allows for private enterprise, democracy, non-racism, and free elections. Mr. Nyerere calls the lack of trained manpower among his people the most pressing national problem and pictures education as the answer to the crisis. To this end, the government has given priority to education, with scholarships to all students attending institutions on the secondary level or above. The program reports on many of the programs underway in Tanzania to raise the standard of living. One of these is the establishment of settlements, a bold and expensive government on land reform and housing a major test for Mr. Nyerere's government. But despite the government's ambitions, Tanzania is both young and poor. It must depend on foreign countries - both East and West - to support its economy and development, at least half of which is financed by foreign loans and aids. The program notes that the one percent, non-African minority population controls most of the industry and commerce of Tanzania, and that President Nyerere, therefore, has called for non-racism to insure continued non-African investments in his country. Mr. Nyerere is seen at democratic political rallies and the program reports on the 1965 national elections in Tanzania which amounted to a vote of confidence in the President's Administration. An undercurrent of caution is reported in the union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, noticeable in the many concessions, which observers feel, Mr. Nyerere has made to maintain the alliance. While the Tanganyika mainland holds 97 percent of the population, half of Tanzania's military strength is on Zanzibar which also controls one-fourth the seats in the National Assembly. The Tanganyika state on the mainland, the program points out, is Western oriented from its British inheritance while Zanzibar is Eastern oriented from its Arab ancestry and its history of trading with the Far East. Much of Zanzibar's foreign aid comes directly from communist countries; East Germany, for instance, has poured nearly a million dollars into a housing project on the island and the army on Zanzibar is trained and equipped by Russians and Red Chinese. In contrast, the mainland forces are trained by Israeli and Canadian advisers and many schools are taught by Americans. President Nyerere's dream that one day all African nations will be united is seen as a reflection at the attempts to reconcile the union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar. Moreover, Tanzania is the host nation for member countries of the Organization of African Unity and a haven for exiles and expatriates of other African nations. In addition to comments by President Nyerere, there are program interviews with leaders in Tanzania's government, foreign investors, an American teacher, a U.S. Peace Corps volunteer, and a local doctor and students. Changing World: Tanzania: The Quiet Revolution is a 1965 National Educational Television production produced for NET by WGBH, Boston's educational station. This program was originally shot on videotape. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche) To give American television viewers a clearer understanding of how the rapid and radical changes now underway in other lands will influence their own lives, National Educational Television launched an incisive bi-monthly series of one-hour documentaries filmed around the globe. Entitled "Changing World," the series premiered in October 1964 on NET's nationwide network of 82 affiliated non-commercial stations. "We believe the scope and design of this series should place it among the season's most important ventures in public affairs television," said William Kobin, director of public affairs programs at NET. "Changing World" will look at the peaceful and not so peaceful revolutions of the mid-twentieth century from the vantage point of the people most deeply and painfully involved in transition. In a systematic way, it will attempt to relate the problems of the various nations and continents to one another, and to the lives of all of us in the United States. "In 'Changing World,'"says Mr. Kobin, "NET has deliberately turned away form a shotgun approach where we would examine only headline-making events. Instead, our producers and their units will be developing, in each instance an organized approach which will afford not only a solid introduction to other peoples and their problems, but a reliable basis on which viewers can judge United States policy, involvement and goals on other continents." (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
Production company:
National Educational Television and Radio Center
Producer:
Morgenthau, Henry, 1917-
Author:
Morgenthau, Henry, 1917-
Production company:
WGBH Educational Foundation
Producer:
Bywaters, Thomas
Interviewee:
Nyerere, Julius K.
Editor:
Bywaters, Tom
Production personnel:
Womack, Jennifer
Creator:
Kaunga, Cyril
Narrator:
Cavness, William
Creator:
Poste, Ken
Date:
January 19, 1966
Format:
Film/Video
Genre:
Documentary
Location:
Indiana University Libraries Moving Image Archive
Collection (local):
American Archive of Public Broadcasting Collection
Series:
Indiana University Libraries Moving Image Archive > Changing World
Subjects:
Economics
Global Affairs
Public Affairs
Politics and Government
Link to Item:
https://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-88cfz5fd
Terms of Use:
Rights status not evaluated.
Contact host institution for more information.
Notes:
Episode Number: 11