Living by Garbage in the Philippines

This short film about the Payatas garbage dump in the Manila suburb of Payatas was first produced in 2003, based on documentary work undertaken in 2001. The garbage dump itself was officially closed in 2017. But that alone did not solve Manila's refuse disposal problem.
In this short film we travel to the Philippines and witness the inhumane conditions under which people once lived by making a living from scavenging garbage. There are still many places in the world where people do this kind of work and live in very similar conditions.