Mozambique / 1997 / 52mins / Documentary / Portuguese

On the southern shores of the Zambesi River — an isolated part of Mozambique, bounded by Zimbabwe and Zambia —the land is a rich source of raw materials. The inhabitants of this region, however, are very poor. ‘Tchuma tchato‘ means ‘our riches‘ and is the name of a project in which the government stimulates the population to jointly exploit and protect the land. It is not an easy task to convince the people of the benefits of this method, which implies, for one, that they can no longer hunt the wild animals in the area. The traditional hunt is an important source of income, and when a hippopotamus gorges all your crops it is hard not to kill him. And the leading spirits, the Lion, the Monkey, the Snake and the Leopard also have to give their permission before the project can succeed.

Licínio Azevedo

Licínio Azevedo (born in Porto Alegre, Brazil) is an independent filmmaker and co-founder of the Mozambican film production company, Ebano Multimedia. In 1977, he was invited by filmmaker Rui Guerra to join the National Institute of Cinema (INC) in Mozambique, and soon after embarked on a prolific career as a documentary filmmaker. He has directed and produced many award-winning documentaries, which have been screened at numerous international festivals. Tchuma Tchato (1997) won a Panda Award at the Wildscreen Festival in the UK in 1998 and was chosen as a finalist at the Third International Environmental Film Festival in Pretoria in 1997. Azevedo has produced and directed several feature films. He is also a writer and his collection of stories on the Mozambican War of Independence formed the basis of Mozambique's first full-length feature film. Virgem Margarida, his 2012 drama, won 2 awards at the Amiens International Film Festival. His 2016 drama, The Train of Salt and Sugar, was nominated for numerous awards and won Best Director at Cairo International Film Festival and the Tanit d'Or for Best Film and Narrative Feature Film at Carthage Film Festival. Learn More