The Last Senegalese Salt Scraper

Palmarin in northern Ceylon. The changing colors are created by cyanobacteria, microscopic organisms which produce a pigment to help them survive the presence of salt. The biggest of these Senegalese salt mines is situated north of Dakar, Lake Retba, better known as Lac Rose or Pink Lake. Ousmane has been doing the painful job of salt scraping for the past 20 years. Every day he goes out onto the lake to load up his boat, while his wife, helped by a friend, unloads the boat he filled up yesterday. I'm piling up salt under my feet. I make several movements to separate it from the mud. The more movements I make, the whiter the salt is. I am the only local man still working on the lake. A lot of immigrants come here from Mali or Guinea to work. The Senegalese don't want to put their feet in the lake to extract salt. The crystals cut your skin. It burns and leaves scars. You can't work here without suffering the consequences. The day seems interminable under the burning sun. Ousmane will carry on until he has filled his boat up to the waterline. The salt I've just unloaded will give us enough to survive on for two days. I say survive, because if I buy enough food to live well, it will only last one day. I used to be a farmer. For a long time I grew millet and rice. But then the drought came, and farming wasn't lucrative enough anymore, so I had to look for something else. So I became a weaver. But because of competition, the price of cloth plummeted. So then I decided to come to Lac Rose to be a salt scraper. This lake has brought me luck. And I love it. Because I had nothing when I came here. I found work here. I met my wife and started a family here. I've done many things in the past that haven't always worked out. But this place has allowed me to earn a living. Ousmane goes home to his wife and children. Tomorrow he will resume uncomplainingly what others call slave labor, and what he simply calls earning a living. It's a daily lesson in resilience and courage by the last Senegalese salt scraper of Lac Rose. In a world that is in a state of flux, Ousmane and all the sentinels of the water are holding out, and fighting for the survival of their heritage. Should they hold out and stay in Senegal, or leave and tempt fate? Elliman and his friend Gaugou, who lost his leg in a fishing accident, are torn between these two choices. To discuss it, they are meeting with a very special woman, Yaie Bayam Duth. She was the first woman in her village to earn a living from fishing, and she fights a constant battle with this clandestine migration, which claimed her only child. My son, along with 80 of his friends, took a boat to Europe in search of some human dignity. His hope evaporated, along with mine, because he was lost at sea. It was difficult. It was very hard for me. The disappearance of my son was a trigger for me. We need credible alternatives if we are to keep our young people in our country. That's when I decided we needed to create economic opportunities for these youngsters. Yaie Bayam Duth had no income after her son died. So, aged over 50, she learned to fish. She then went on to set up a fish farm. Today, she employs young people and teaches them about sustainable fishing. Hello, everyone. How are you, madam? Well, thanks. What's your name? Yaie Bayam Duth. I'm from Thierry-sur-Mer. Oh, yes, I've heard of you. You're like a big sister to us, and that's a really good thing. People say that what leads you into the darkness can also teach you how to come out the other side. Yes. I held a session to raise awareness in schools. I asked one pupil, do you know the sea they call the Mediterranean? And he said, yes, that's where our parents go to die. Imagine a child growing up with such an idea that the Mediterranean is no longer a bridge between Africa and Europe, but rather a human cemetery. It's a tragedy, a real tragedy. We have to stop now and rethink things. We must believe in ourselves, in our country. Why risk death to seek work elsewhere? These people in Europe are not extraordinary. They are no cleverer than we are. They are just better organized. Look at all the fish processing plants here. They're all run by foreigners. We go out to sea and do all the hard work. We bring in our catch, and then we flock it to them. They process it and export it. I bring back a product, but that's not enough. I need to add value to it so I can sell it for a higher price. Wherever there is water, sunshine and the strength to work, there can be development.