In “The Grab,” Director Gabriela Cowperthwaite, who also directed Our Friend, Megan Leavey, and Blackfish, follows investigative journalist Nate Halverson and his team as they uncover the growing geopolitical conflicts behind food and water in the 21st century, traveling from China and Africa to the Middle East and across America, discovering a world being torn apart by inequity and resource conflict.
The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September and has been described by RogerEbert.com as the “The ‘holy s&%t’ documentary of the year.” The Grab reveals the invisible forces working to control the world’s food and water resources.
The film screening in Cowles Auditorium will be followed by Q&A with journalist Nate Halverson and Human Rights Lawyer Brigadier Siachitema, moderated by Associate Professor Bonnie Keeler.
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About Producer and Journalist Nate Halverson
Nate Halverson is an Emmy Award-winning senior reporter and producer at The Center for Investigative Reporting, covering business and finance with an emphasis on the global food system. CIR’s weekly investigative reporting program “Reveal” airs on 600+ public radio stations, including MPR News stations. Nate’s reporting has been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition, Fox News, Mother Jones, Newsweek, The Denver Post, MSNBC, and CNN. Nate is a graduate of the University of Minnesota’s Hubbard School of Journalism and a former staff writer at the Minnesota Daily.
About Brigadier Siachitema, Human Rights Lawyer for Southern Africa Litigation Centre
Brigadier Siachitema is a lawyer and human rights advocate with decades of experience litigating land rights disputes, property grabbing and gender-based violence. Prior to joining SALC, he spent six years as an advocate at the International Justice Mission (IJM) protecting indigent victims of succession and inheritance land rights violations in Zambia, mostly widows and orphans, through litigation. Since 2015, he has been the legal advisor and an ex-officio board member for the Zambian Land Alliance, a network of Zambian Non- Governmental Organisations (NGOs) working with rural and urban poor communities to ensure that land policies, laws and practices take their interests into account. In September 2020, the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights appointed Mr. Brigadier as an Expert Member of its Working Group on Extractive Industries, Environment and Human Rights Violation in Africa. Mr Brigadier holds an LL. B degree from the University of Zambia, an LL.M degree in Extractive Industries Law in Africa from the University of Pretoria, an LL.M degree in International Business and Economic Law from Georgetown University Law Center and an MSt Studies in International Human Rights Law from the University of Oxford.
This event is made possible due to the support of the Swain Climate Policy Series that mobilizes civic engagement to confront the climate crisis.