Watch a clip of the film here:
Third World countries are giving the West more in debt repayment than we give them in aid. Soaring interest rates have resulted in increasing poverty for debtor countries, although their original loans have long been paid.
A MATTER OF INTEREST uses imaginative animation to explore the complex and seemingly distant problem of international debt. It looks at historical and economic factors, including the roles played by the banks, the International Monetary Fund, and the governments of debtor countries. It shows the crippling effect that repayment is having on economies, the environment, ordinary people and their traditional ways of life.
The film explores the parallel stories of Maisy, a woman caught up with rising mortgage rates, and the situation in Brazico, an imaginary South American state. It shows the actions taken by people in the Third World to resist the devastating effects of debt on their lives, and suggests that we in the West can also take action to confront this pressing problem.