British actor, model and director Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje's film Farming is based on his childhood experiences growing up in Essex, east of London. It tells the story of a young Nigerian boy 'farmed out' by his parents to a white British family in the hope of a better future. Instead, he joins a white skinhead gang. Farming premieres on Rialto Channel, Saturday 14 November at 8.30pm with further screenings in November and December. More info here:

For decades he's been studying one of the rarest and most publicity shy breeds of dog on the planet. Now American zoologist and retired biology teacher James 'Mac' McIntyre has made his breakthrough discovery. Through DNA tests conducted on animals trapped on a series of intrepid expeditions through Papua New Guinea and West Papua, he's managed to establish that the New Guinea Singing Dog- also known as the New Guinea Highland Wild Dog- still survives in the wild. Until this discovery the breed was only thought to survive in a captive (and highly inbred) population scattered around the globe. Mac's the founder of the New Guinea Highland Wild Dog Foundation and has another highly specialised research interests: intersex pigs in Vanuatu.

COVID-19 has put the power and accuracy of statistics at centre stage. Infection rates, 'R' numbers, new cases, hospital admissions and the data underpinning new vaccines are being used by the media to tell stories about the pandemic, and are scrutinised daily to make vital public health decisions. It is familiar territory for 'undercover economist', journalist and broadcaster Tim Harford who explores the beauty of statistics, and their uses, abuses and shortcomings in his new book How to Make the World Add Up. The book is Harford's eighth following his bestseller The Undercover Economist, and the popular book (and BBC podcast) 50 Things that Made the Modern Economy.

News that a collaboration between Pfizer and BioNTech has produced an effective coronavirus vaccine sent world stockmarkets soaring this week. Pfizer said early results suggest the vaccine is more than 90 percent effective in preventing the disease among trial volunteers who had not previously been infected. With no safety concerns as yet, the results have been described as "stunning". So is this the breakthrough we have all been waiting for? And can people now start thinking about booking that overseas trip in mid-2021? We'll ask our regular guest, Dr Chris Smith, consultant clinical virologist at Cambridge University, and one of BBC Radio 5 Live's Naked Scientists what he makes of the news.

Listener feedback 7 November 2020.

As Historian-in-Residence of the Presidential Pet Museum Andrew Hager records the menagerie of domestic animals that have called The White House home. Recently Donald Trump's failure to own a pet became the subject of some of Joe Biden's campaign ads. Should Mr Biden be declared president, his two German Shepherds, Major and Champ, will join cows, snakes, goats, parrots, pigs, turkeys,elephants, lion cubs, a pygmy hippo, a bear, and the odd wallaby who have lived at the White House.

Born from a chance encounter in a Laotian opium den in 1973, Alan Brunton and Sally Rodwell's avant-garde troupe Red Mole exemplified political, provocative, creative and chaotic theatre. Their performances mixed theatre, song, dance, satire and (sometimes) huge puppets, and were built on a core manifesto of five principles which included 'escape programmed behaviour by remaining erratic'. Born in Ohakune and now living in Sydney, Martin Edmond was an actor, writer and later lighting technician in the group. In his new book Bus Stops to the Moon: Red Mole Days 1974-1980, he shares an intimate history of the group's highs and lows.

How will the global rise of populism, allied to the pandemic, shape the future of international law? Professor Campbell McLachlan QC of Victoria Law School recently returned to New Zealand from Berlin, where he was considering this issue at the Berlin-Potsdam Research Group. He argues that the brand of populism we are seeing in countries including the US, UK and Brazil has weakened the world's capacity to respond to COVID-19 through the usual mechanisms to combat the threat of infectious diseases. He is currently serving as one of a 16-member Commission of the Institute of International Law on 'Pandemics and International Law'. Next year he takes up the Arthur Goodhart Visiting Professorship of Legal Science at the University of Cambridge.

Poet, playwright, and novelist Jackie Kay is the current makar (the National Poet of Scotland) and previous winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize. Born in Edinburgh to a Nigerian father and Scottish mother she was then adopted and grew up in Glasgow. Her play The Lamplighter has recently been reissued and follows five characters sold into the British slave trade: in the process she explores Scotland's often overlooked role in this. She ran the Makar to Makar online performance project during lockdown when literary festivals were cancelled. She also has a book on the blues singer Bessie Smith due out next year.

Former politician, environmentalist and activist Peter Garrett first came to prominence as the lead singer of the Australian band Midnight Oil, welding socially conscious lyrics with atmospheric vistas of Australia seen from the back of a flatbed truck. After a hiatus of nearly two decades Midnight Oil are back with a new 'mini album' called The Makarrata Project. The album features a cross section of First Nations' musicians including Jessica Mauboy, Alice Skye and Tasman Keith, with the band donating its proceeds to organisations committed to The Uluru Statement from The Heart (2017). This called for greater reconciliation with Australia's Indigenous population, including the establishment of a 'First Nations Voice' enshrined in the Australian Constitution, and the creation of a 'Makarrata Commission' to supervise agreements and communications between governments and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.