Well done to Alessandro Cinque (Italy) for being the first-time winner of the Sustainability Prize for his series Atrapanieblas (Fog Nets). He receives a $5,000 cash prize and a presentation of his project as part of the Sony World Photography Awards exhibition in London.
Commenting on his win Cinque says: ‘I am very honoured and happy to have won this prize. I like to think that, through my photography and thanks to the wide reach of this award, we are helping give a voice to people who struggle daily with water scarcity, a problem that affects more than 40% of the world's population according to the United Nations. It is important to highlight the efforts in Lima to combat this shortage, in the hope that these stories will stir consciences and that, finally, we will understand the importance of joining together to address climate change and create a fairer world for all.’
The Sustainability Prize is part of global year-round creator engagement programme developed in collaboration with the United Nations Foundation and Sony Pictures’ Picture This initiative. Read more here.
Atrapanieblas by Alessandro Cinque
After Cairo, Lima is the second city in the world to be built in a desert. In recent years, migration from rural Peru to Lima has increased significantly, but the people who manage to settle in Lima are typically very poor and their biggest problem is lack of water.
One solution that gives them hope is fog nets. Consisting of two poles that support a nylon net with small holes in it, these nets can collect about 200 litres (53 gallons) of water per day. The founder of the project is Abel Cruz, who started work on it more than 20 years ago, when he left his home region of Cusco and came to Lima to live in a settlement where water was a luxury. According to Abel, there are now about 140 fog nets installed in Lima; this project aims to show how this artisanal method could help combat water shortages.
