Nelufar Hedayat
(L to R): Host Nelufar Hedayat talks with Nicole Richie, Dominic Monaghan and Moby in “Food Exposed”
The "Food Exposed with Nelufar Hedayat" Interview
The "Food Exposed with Nelufar Hedayat" Interview
with
Kam Williams
Mademoiselle
Nel!
Having
fled war-torn Afghanistan as a child herself, Nel’s work has often
focused on cultural upheaval experienced by women, children and
families in conflict-ridden societies. The
unique way the series covered a bold range of subjects with
incredible depth of research and investigative efforts netted the
team a raft of awards and nominations.
These
included the International Affairs Award at the Association of
International Broadcasters 2017 and Best Investigation at the Asian
Media Awards 2017
and
also the coveted Reporter/Correspondent Gracie Award (the Alliance
for Women in Media) and Journalist of the Year at the Asian Media
Awards. Individual episodes, including Killed for a Horn and Fake
Pharma, were finalists for numerous awards, including the Livingston
Awards and the Edward J. Meeman Award for Environmental Reporting at
the Scripps Howard Awards 2017.
As
a result of her reporting in Organs for Sale, Nel was invited to the
Vatican, to the Summit of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, to
report on her findings and as a signatory on the Resolution on Organ
Trafficking which has recently been ratified by the Council of
Europe. In 2015, she was nominated for Journalist of the Year at the
British Asian Media Awards, following her Unreported World report,
Vaccination Wars, which was also nominated in the Best Investigation
category.
In
that eye-opening expose', she met with healthcare workers risking
their lives to vaccinate children against polio in Pakistan, despite
the Taliban's actively targeting and killing them. In her first
Unreported World episode, Vietnam’s Dog Snatchers, she investigated
how dog thieves were making millions in the highly lucrative and
illegal dog meat trade by stealing thousands of pets from families.
In
the six years Nel worked for the BBC, she presented, co-produced and
wrote documentaries for television and radio, including the
award-winning Women, Weddings, War and Me, Shot for Going to School,
and Music, Money & Hip Hop Honeys. She also presented and hosted
the flagship live news program Newsround which was aimed at younger
audiences, winning an award for her short film air on the show, The
Kids of Kabul.
Here,
Nel, who speaks English, Farsi, Hindi and Dari, talks about her new
TV series, Food
Exposed with Nelufar Hedayat.
Kam
Williams: Hi
Nel, thanks for the interview.
Nelufar
Hedayat
:
It's
my pleasure, Kam.
KW:
What interested you in the subject of food after having focused on so
many life and death issues? Are you a foodie?
NH:
It’s
not so much that I wanted to become a food blogger or chef of sorts,
but more that I kept bumping into the issue. I found myself doing a
lot of research in my own time after work about it. And when I
started to realize that a lot of what I was focusing on in The
Traffickers was corporate greed, the blurred lines between legal and
illegal exploitation and corruption seemed to cross over into the
industrial food complex so effortlessly that it naturally piqued my
curiosity.
KW:
What
are some of the topics you'll be exploring on the series?
NH:
I
took a deep dive. From the water needed to sustain life and how much
of it is privately owned at source; to the ever growing problem of
antibiotic use in so much of our meat and dairy industry, to the need
to take a more nuanced look at the palm oil and fishing industries,
we really tried to tackle the big issues.
KW:
What
message do you hope viewers will take away from Food Exposed?
NH:
I
don't really want to advocate for anything. I never really do. My
work and travels have truly shown me that it’s so easy to sit there
and have clean lines and definitions of things. Good, bad, right and
wrong are so difficult to qualify or even identify sometimes that I
wouldn’t want to tell people what to do at all. What I do want to
change is the one-sided noise that the big corporations and massive
industry giants feed us. This narrative of buy as much as you can,
eat more than you enjoy and worry not about where your food comes
from is toxic. Multimillion dollar, well connected, well-coordinated
lobbying groups in the US control so much of the message and
conversation around food that counter-narratives are very important.
KW: You were born in Afghanistan. Do you still feel a connection to the country?
NH:
Afghanistan
is my motherland, as Britain is my homeland. One bore me, the other
made me. I listen to Afghan news and connect with the diaspora as
often as I can, and I travel to Kabul, where I was born, often.
KW:
Whom do
you blame for its decades of violence, and what do you think is the
best path to a permanent peace in the war-torn region?
NH:
Do
you have space for 20,000 words? I blame almost everyone for the
current violence, death, destruction and loss of life in my
motherland. Half-assed fraternization by Western powers who seem only
interested when the Taliban or ISIS needs to be swatted; a government
that has big dreams and little realization of those dreams and
remains one of the most supported in the world; and neighbors that
make you look longingly at your enemies; to name just a few. The idea
of permanent peace is so far away from what is achievable in
Afghanistan within my lifetime that I find it whimsical. I think the
current U.S. administration, and I cannot believe I’m saying this,
is perhaps making a better go of it than the previous one ever did.
Where Obama was inertia, Mr Trump’s administration seems to be
doing something. Dropping the Mother of All Bombs is not really what
I have in mind, but putting more resources, dedicating more
person-power and calling out the Pakistani meddling is a good place
to start. Where it ends up is anyone’s guess, much like the rest of
the Trump agenda.
KW:
Have
you ever considered moving back there to run for office or to
spearhead a non-violence movement, a la Ghandi and Dr. King? Or do
you think it would be a thankless task, and you'd just end up shot in
the face like Malala was for standing up for women's rights in
Pakistan?
NH:
Run
for office? You’re off your rocker, Kam. I have no such aspirations
and I really don't think I’d be good at it. I'm a storyteller. I
live and breathe reading, telling and capturing stories of people and
places, and that’s what I hope to do for as long as I can. Also,
the mere fact that you have put my name next to Martin L. King and
Mahatma Gandhi is making me anxious. They are nothing short of
superhumans much like Malala Yousafzai. Me? I still like Boomeranging
pictures of my cat.
KW:
You're
being modest. You made a documentary about Malala called Shot
for Going to School. What do you think of her?
NH:
Malala
was the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. When I met her,
she had a transcendent aura of purpose and mission. She's a total
badass who took on the tyranny and hatefulness of the Taliban in
Pakistan to fight for her right, as a girl, to education.
KW:
What
do you see as the answer to the school shootings in America?
NH:
School
shootings in America are, ostensibly, young men with extremely easy
access to weapons of war who, for whatever reason, murder their
friends and colleagues and often themselves. In a strange, macabre
and eerie way, the two achieve the same end: terrorizing children and
disrupting their basic human right. The optics are interesting, too.
One, we look at with disdain and horror, outraged that an education
is denied to young people who fear for their lives as they enter the
school gates every day not knowing if this might be the day an
assault rifle is pulled on them. The other, we call Taliban
extremism.
KW:
You've
traveled all over the world. Where would you like to settle down?
NH:
Settle
down is a strange concept for me. I was a refugee for so long and so
early in my life. And the last decade of my career has taken me to so
many places around the world that being in one permanently feels odd.
Having said that, when people ask I tell them I was born in Kabul but
London Town has adopted me. I’m a Londoner through and through, so
perhaps I'll settle there one day.
KW:
You
have an award-winning TV series called The Traffickers. What black
markets were you most surprised to uncover?
NH:
The
gold episode and sex trafficking were most illuminating for me. The
illegal market in gold, because it truly is impossible to guarantee
that the gold on your finger, around your neck or in your smartphone
isn't covered in blood, violence and death since, when melted down,
the gold sheds these things. The sex trafficking episode because, in
a way, it altered and shaped my feminism, I started the journey
firmly on the ‘legalize and regulate’ side of the debate,
thinking that once sex becomes work and not illegal then we can
better look after the women and men in the business. But after nearly
a month on the road and really digging deep, I flipped. People often
point to Amsterdam as a bastion of success when it comes to regulated
prostitution, working for the people in sex work. I found the
opposite. Lover boys, traffickers and pimps just found ways around
the system and they will always find a way around any regulation put
in place. Trafficking in persons is a power game. Women are broken
with unspeakable violence and then used. Make it illegal and they’ll
just use Airbnb or go online in other ways.
KW:
What
was the last book you read?
NH:
Postcapitalism
by Paul Mason. He’s a former colleague of mine. I used to sit
opposite him in the Channel 4 newsroom.
KW:
What is
your earliest childhood memory?
NH:
Being
on a hot and smelly bus on the Jalalabad Pass, hidden under my mum's
burkha, seeing only its mustard color, as we went from Kabul to
Peshawar.
KW:
Was
there a meaningful spiritual component to your childhood?
NH:
Nah.
KW:
What is your favorite dish to cook?
NH:
Oooooh,
now we’re talking! I love cooking Afghan food, because most if it
is vegan anyway. This is where my culture and heritage really kick
in. Cooking Afghan food is a group mission. Back home, women would
gather together, chatting, singing and gossiping as they prepared
dishes that can take days to prepare and hours to cook. My favorite
to cook at home with my mum and two sisters is Aashak, little
dumplings with the green bits of leek, steamed, then drizzled with a
chickpea sauce, garlic yogurt and dried mint. Yummy!
KW:
When
you look in the mirror, what do you see?
NH:
That
depends on the day. Sometimes it's clear, sometimes I can eyeball
myself for minutes and see a stranger. Sometimes beautiful, often
haggard. Mostly though, a wondering soul with little shape and more
thought bubble than person.
KW:
What's
the craziest thing you've ever done?
NH:
Ahem.
That would be telling.
KW:
If you
could have one wish instantly granted, what would that be for?
NH:
For
the world to be vegan. Step one of my Grand Plan.
KW:
Is there any question no one ever asks you, that you wish someone
would?
NH:
Nah.
I'm not that original.
KW:
What advice do you have for anyone who wants to follow in your
footsteps?
NH:
Binge
on documentaries. Watch as much as you can. Whenever you see one that
you want to have made, wait for the credits and take down the name of
the company that made it, along with the execs. Now pester them.
Email, call, tweet and DM them until you get into a room with them.
Then dazzle them with all the fantastic original ideas you have.
KW:
How do
you want to be remembered?
NH:
I’d
like to be remembered as someone who tried, who went out there to get
the story from the horse’s mouth. And as a tolerant person,
respectful of all the myriad of beautiful ways humanity expresses
itself.
KW:
Finally,
what’s in your wallet?
NH:
120
dollars from my trip to New York City, 7 British pounds, expense
receipts unclaimed for about a year, coffee shop loyalty cards, and
passport photos.
KW:
Thanks
again for the time, Nel, and best of luck with Food Exposed.
NH: Thank you very
much, Kam.
To
see a trailer for Food
Exposed with Nelufar Hedayat,
visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWmDP5m-0_g&feature=youtu.be
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