{"id":24367,"date":"2025-11-07T16:42:49","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T14:42:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/?p=24367"},"modified":"2025-11-07T16:42:51","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T14:42:51","slug":"coming-up-on-carte-blanche-9-november-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/blog\/2025\/11\/07\/coming-up-on-carte-blanche-9-november-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Coming Up On Carte Blanche – 9 November 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cIn the weeks before COVID struck, I arranged a trip to Svalbard, deep in the Arctic Circle, to film an insert on the \u201cDoomsday\u201d seed vault. Sadly, not long before I was due to leave, the pandemic intervened and air travel ground to a halt. So, I take great satisfaction in being able to broadcast a story on Svalbard\u2019s Seed Vault this Sunday. And, for the record, I bear no grudges against our intrepid producer, Nickolaus Bauer, for having visited a place on my bucket list. I can, however, confirm, that I seem to have misplaced his invoice.\u201d – John Webb, Executive Producer<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Blueprint for Corruption<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In June, we went inside Johannesburg\u2019s Metro Centre to expose the state of the City\u2019s archives: around one million building plans tumbled from shelves and lay mouldering on the floor in a condemned building, while employees were relocated to safety. Our guide: a civil servant who seemed eager to share his frustration at the collapse of service delivery. Little did we know that, three months later, our inside man would be accused of selling the very building plans he’s meant to organise. We return to investigate a government official taking service delivery to the next level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Producer: Harri Vithi | Presenter: Masa Kekana<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hot Copper<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

South Africa is being unplugged. Once a small-scale crime of opportunity, copper theft has morphed into a shadow industry as syndicates, smugglers and silent buyers strip the nation for profit. With cargo trucks, foundries and warehouses being targeted, legitimate traders are forced to hire armed escorts to protect their assets. Meanwhile, train networks halt, vital infrastructure is crippled, and communities are plunged into darkness. We get the inside track on the movement of stolen copper and meet the companies hunting down syndicates. It\u2019s not just copper theft: it\u2019s sabotage of our national stability. Carte Blanche<\/strong><\/em> connects the wires on the illicit copper trade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Producer: Nicky Troll | Presenter: Govan Whittles<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Final Shift<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

What happens to a town when the mine that built it fades? In Postmasburg, on the edge of the Kalahari, generations of miners and their families have lived in the shadow and dust of the Beeshoek iron ore mine, while the mine club at the town\u2019s heart has bred more than its share of rugby stars. But now, its future hangs in the balance. Soaring tariffs, a spiralling energy crisis, and collapsing transport networks have dismantled the local steel industry. The ore that once fuelled jobs now feeds foreign furnaces, and the mine that has sustained a community for 99 years will not see its centenary. As the country\u2019s industrial heart falls silent, one small community faces a reckoning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Producer: Anina Peens | presenter: Govan Whittles<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Seeds of Survival<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Deep under the Arctic snow and ice, a hidden \u201cDoomsday Vault\u201d safeguards the world\u2019s crop diversity. The Svalbard Seed Vault is a rare beacon of global cooperation and trust, an insurance policy against war, agricultural disaster and climate catastrophe. But even as a new consignment of seeds is deposited in the vault, the impacts of climate change are making themselves visible to scientists and residents. Carte Blanche<\/strong><\/em> witnesses the work of a place that symbolises a fragile but enduring global trust, and asks: how long before the vault\u2019s ambitious plan to battle climate collapse is really put to the test?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Producer & Presenter: Nickolaus Bauer<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

STREAMING NOW<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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