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This Oscar-nominated documentary is a harrowing account of the economical and ecological affects that the non-native Nile Perch has wrecked on Lake Victoria in Tanzania. Over the last forty years, the huge fish has created a booming fishery business, which is now the chief export of the country. However, the people living along the banks of the world’s second largest lake are starving.

After the fish are processed, the people can only afford to buy the leftover fish heads that are fried up at maggot-ridden facilities. Foreign companies run the fisheries exporting hundreds of tons of fish a day. Planes come in, but bring nothing of worth for the people — only weapons to fuel the profitable civil strife that ravages many of the countries on the continent.

One security guard at the fishery got his job, because the last guy who did it was murdered. He patrols the grounds with poison arrows and says that he’s instructed to wait until the intruders cross the fence, because then he can legally kill them.

The film sadly looks into the lives of the average people. HIV/AIDS is killing up to 45 fishermen in six months. Many of the women are forced into prostitution to survive. With so many adults dying of AIDS, many children are left to live on the streets alone. To get through the day, some melt the plastic from the fish packages and stiff the fumes to get high and forget. In one devastating scene, a group of young children fight over a bowl of rice like a pack of dogs.

The deplorable conditions these people live under while the privileged minority looks the other way and gets rich is sickening. At a conference attended by leaders of Tanzania, one man argues that a report on how the Nile Perch are going to kill off all life in the lake is just showing the bad side of things. It’s this single-minded attention to profit, which will lead the whole country into ruin within a matter of decades.

The conditions in the lake have gotten so bad that the Nile Perch have resorted to eating their young. How will the fisheries survive when their chief product is devouring the future output? For those unaware of the situation in Africa today, this film will be an appalling wake-up call. Even if you do know, it’s still an eye-opening experience. Slavery has been abolished in most of the world, but the conditions in Africa are a form of economic slavery. If you’re born to poor parents, you have no hope of anything greater. These people are human beings and should not have to live like they do. This moving document of the people of Tanzania is a must see for anyone who wants to know what’s going on in Africa today.