The Climate Revolutionary - A Documentary

Aim

Help us make this powerful documentary following a village leader on a dramatic mission to COP31 to fight for climate justice for his people

One Man's Fight for Climate Justice

For the people of Walewale in Ghana, climate change isn't some abstract concept - it's real and it's destroying their livelihoods right now, not some time in the future. 

They don't want to know about the science, statistics or political arguments - they want action.

Issifu Sulemana is a local farmer and activist. For years now he has been working with his team to improve the lot of his farming neighbours with a range of innovations, from natural fertilisers to crop rotation and improved irrigation. 

But their efforts are being thwarted by changing climate conditions, and it's getting worse: extreme drought followed by devastating floods and then more drought.

And they're angry.

“Why should communities like ours pay for the luxuries and lifestyles of the global north? We are here fighting climate change every single day,” says Issifu.

It is, he claims, the poorest and most vulnerable in rural areas who are paying the price for the profligacy of rich countries.

The Hero's Journey

Our story begins in Walewale in the north eastern region of Ghana, a town in the heart of the Northern Plains on the edge of the semi-arid African Sahel, a borderland between the Sahara and the greener central African region.

It’s a hot, dusty town surrounded by farmland and this is where we find Issifu Sulemena working with his team at the Centre for Ecological Agriculture and Livelihoods (CEAL). The NGO works with smallholder famers to develop sustainable agricultural practices which Issifu hopes with help bring an end to poverty and hunger in the region.

The work is not easy in an area where the rain comes once a year, if at all, and in recent times climate change has started to make farming life almost impossible.

Tall, charismatic and affable, but increasingly frustrated and angry, Issifu is extremely vocal in his belief that his community, like many in Africa, is paying the price for the fossil-fuelled consumerist lifestyles of the industrial Global North.

In the film we follow Issifu as he works hard with his community to survive the crisis. We experience the everyday grind to grow or find food. 

We witness his ideas and innovations and the massive improvments he makes, only to see them literally washed away in flash floods or burnt to a crisp in the incessant heat of the “lean season”. 

And we hear his anger, his rage at world leaders who fail to properly address the climate crisis - largely through denial and a reluctance to upset the comfortable lives of their rich citizens. He’s furious that presidents and prime ministers don’t even turn up to the annual climate COP organised by the United nation’s UNFCCC Secretariat. 

And so he wants to travel to COP31 in Antalya, Turkey. There he hopes to confront world leaders with the reality of the suffering of his people due to climate change. He wants his community to be heard. and he wants rich nations to take action. But will they listen? It promises to be quite a showdown.

A platform for change

We plan to make this documentary as a platform for a comprehensive education and awareness campaign for climate change and climate justice.

It’s hard to comprehend the suffering, hunger and grinding poverty of those in the Sahel - if we knew, would we do something about it? Would we give up our lifestyles for a carbon-neutral existence? The real consequences of our fossil-fuelled consumerist society haven’t hit us yet, but for Issifu and his people, the crisis has already arrived.

The platform will be built on a Climate Action Toolkit - a web/app-based resource that will combine stories, bonus video clips, text, and images with a set of downloadable resources, educational materials and online advice.

With additional deep background this Multi-Format Immersive Story platform will not only be a great learning resource, it can offer an additional discussion opportunity during and after educational and conference screenings.

There is also ample scope for breaking down many of the elements of the online resource for re-purposing as social media content, newsletters and outreach.

Issifu is working with his people to mitigate the effects of the climate crisis by changing farming practices and promoting environmental awareness - What are we going to do?

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made by 6th July 2026 at 2:15pm