"What makes a girl or boy smile or laugh or jump for joy, what makes you happy?"
Wendy Cope

The Ragdoll Foundation launches a groundbreaking initiative designed to demonstrate the strength and power that children have when living "against the odds". Premiered in the UK on Channel Five.

Each programme is based on the experiences of children in very different situations: a housing estate in the United Kingdom, a mountain village in Nepal, an industrial city in China, the desert in Ethiopia, a refugee camp in Occupied Palestinian Territories and a post tsunami village in Sri Lanka.

We are in the process of developing further films in Uganda, Bangladesh and Vietnam.

To give the films honesty and to make the stories as real as possible and as close to the hearts of the communities as possible, we set up workshops in each of the countries. By actively involving a wide group of children within each country to develop the story, we ensure that the films stay true to the children's own experiences and give the children and their communities a stake in the production.

By exploring 'happiness' we create positive energy and ultimately a series of films that have equal status on the broadcast platform. Each film runs approximately 12 minutes with completely diverse and original stories that are both entertaining and informative. There is no need for voice over or sub-titles as each story is easily understood by pictures alone and language is used only as representation of the culture. Target age group is 8 years old.

An important facet of this project is to build up relationships with local film makers and to use as many local personnel as possible. This not only gives each programme a style of its own, but also enables film makers to cross the cultural divide and get their work shown internationally. Many of the film makers are relatively inexperienced and we hope the opportunity of working on this series gives them a new experience and a wider profile. The first six programmes have been shown at numerous international film festivals and have been awarded trophies from Iran and China.

'what makes me happy' has a format that is particularly successful in building empathy with groups of children who are highly politicised or seen as a threat. The series encourages the viewer to identify with the child first, rather than with the popular stereotype. This is a great benefit in breaking down stigma and building empathy with groups such as former child soldiers, refugees, asylum seekers, internally displaced or persecuted minorities at the local as well as national and international levels. More generally these groups of children are very under represented in media and virtually 'forgotten' by the outside world.

Produced by:
Annie Gibbs for the Ragdoll Foundation
From an idea by Anne Wood, Founder of Ragdoll Limited and Trustee of the Ragdoll Foundation

The series was originated for Save the Children by Anne Wood and is now a Ragdoll Foundation project:-

• Ranjita's Film, Nepal
• Junjie's Film, China
• Mahmoud's Film, Palestine
• Amran's Film, Ethiopia
• Tommy's Film, UK
• Hashi's Film, Sri Lanka

The first series is broadcast in the UK by Channel Five, and in Sweden and The Netherlands by Sveriges TB AB and KRO respectively.

The Ragdoll Foundation is currently producing a second series of seven films in partnership with DFID and KRO.

New Programmes:

South Sudan - completed
Colombia - completed
The Netherlands (in association with KRO) - completed
Vietnam (in association with DFID) - completed
Bangladesh (in association with DFID) - currently filming
Uganda (in association with DFID) - completed
USA - at research stage - 50% funding pledged