Telephone helplines support millions of children every year with issues ranging from serious abuse to children who just want someone to chat to on the way home from school. Ella Al-Shamahi talks to two women from South Africa and Greece about supporting children through round-the-clock helplines, counselling and outreach.

Dumisile Cele, a trained social worker, is the Chief Executive Officer of Childline South Africa. Their 24-hour helpline is contacted around 300,000 times each year. Dumisile says the mental health challenges in children are especially driven by violent crimes, abuse and trauma perpetuated against them.

Stavroula Spyropoulou is a psychologist working at Smile of the Child in Greece. The organisation operates across the country and has over 400 staff and 6000 active volunteers. They give families immediate support in times of crisis, run children’s homes and outreach sessions in schools. Stavroula is the coordinator of their Center for Child Abuse and Exploitation.

There is a global network of child helplines in 132 countries and it's hoped that by 2030 every country in the world will have a helpline. There's a list of them all, and their contact phone numbers on the website of Child Helpline International.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

(Image: (L) Dumisile Cele courtesy Child Helpline South Africa. (R) Stavroula Spyropoulou courtesy Smile of the Child.)

If you're planning a big celebration, the idea of having someone else handle all the cooking might feel like a dream...but for some it's a worthwhile indulgence. Hiring a private chef means enjoying delicious, personalised food with minimal effort in the comfort of your own home. Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to two private chefs from India and France who create unforgettable culinary experiences.

Indian award-winning chef Abhilasha Chandak decided to become a private chef after moving to London three years ago. She gained fame in 2016 by competing in the Indian version of Masterchef and getting to the final. Abhilasha has cooked for a whole range of clients, including Bollywood celebrities.

Ella Aflalo is a French private chef and cookbook author based in Paris with experience in Michelin-starred kitchens. She now curates bespoke culinary experiences inspired by her travels, art and fashion. Previously, Ella founded the restaurant Yima, the name a blend of the Hebrew and Arabic word for ‘mum’. It won the Michelin Bib Gourmand, a reward given to restaurants serving high-quality food at affordable prices.

Produced by Emily Naylor

(Image: (L) Abhilasha Chandak courtesy Abhilasha Chandak. (R) Ella Aflalo credit Chloé Bruhat.)

Datshiane Navanayagam speaks to Angie Chioko and Nika Kokareva about clearing landmines and unexploded ordnance, in order to return safe land to their communities. At the end of 2024, The Landmine Monitor Report revealed that children suffer disproportionately from landmines across the world. The remnants of war remain in the ground for decades, claiming civilian lives, long after the fighting had ended.

Angie Chioko is a Supervisor at the Mazowe Camp in Zimbabwe, working for The Halo Trust. Zimbabwe is one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. The minefields were laid in the 1970s during a civil war by the country’s ruling army. In Zimbabwe today, the landmines cut off access to water supplies, pasture land, and cause children to take longer routes to school.

Nika Kokareva is a Team Leader in the Mykolaiv region of Ukraine, working for Mines Advisory Group. The country has seen a rise in landmines and unexploded ordnance since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The United Nations Development Programme has said Ukraine is now the most mined country in the world, with potentially 23 percent of its land at risk of contamination with landmines and unexploded ordnance.

Produced by Elena Angelides

Image: (L) Nika Kokareva credit Mines Advisory Group. (R) Angie Chioko credit The Halo Trust.)

Chronic illness - and the pain it often brings - affects millions globally. But while women are more likely to experience chronic pain, they’re less likely to receive adequate treatment. Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to two women who have transformed their experiences with pain and chronic illness into powerful creative expression.

Polly Crosby is a British author living with cystic fibrosis. Feeling invisible in the stories she grew up reading, she was inspired to write The Vulpine, a young adult novel deeply rooted in her personal experiences: the protagonist’s condition closely reflects Polly’s own. Polly is dedicated to portraying characters with disabilities and chronic conditions authentically, without invoking pity or hero-worship.

Lavi Picu is a Romanian-Canadian interdisciplinary artist and Lyme disease advocate. She uses painting, drawing, and poetry as therapeutic tools to manage her condition while raising awareness for chronic illness. Lavi's art acts as a visual aid to, in her words, "make the invisible visible".

Produced by Emily Naylor

Image: (L) Polly Crosby credit Archant. (R) Lavi Picu courtesy of Lavi Picu.)

What do Audre Lorde, Pamela Anderson and Florence Nightingale all have in common? They all began writing diaries as young girls and remained seasoned diarists later in life. But what purpose does keeping a diary as a teenager serve? And what can reflecting on the intimate accounts our younger selves wrote, tell us about who we are today and the changing world around us?

Ifedayo Agoro is a Nigerian entrepreneur who began writing a diary at the age of eleven. The habit began after she got into trouble at school, and wrote her mother a letter to explain what had happened. As punishment, her mother asked Ifedayo to pen a letter every week in a diary, and Ifedayo documented life as a young girl in the Shogunle neighbourhood of Lagos. This punishment soon became a joy and in 2015 Ifedayo wrote an anonymous online diary called Diary Of A Naija Girl. Five years later, she put her name to the diary and it now has 740,000 followers on Instagram.

Sophie Duker is a British comedian and writer. She is currently touring Europe with her stand-up show, But Daddy I Love Her, inspired by the concept of delusion. Sophie began writing an online diary at the age of 14, capturing matters of emotional significance such as her parent’s divorce, her father moving from the UK and her first encounter with grief. These profound milestones are interwoven with the everyday highs and lows of being a British teenager: crushes on the Harry Potter cast and encounters with school bullies.

Produced by Elena Angelides and Jane Thurlow

Image: (L) Ifedayo Agoro credit Buklaw Photography. (R) Sophie Duker credit Sarah Harry-Isaacs.)

Datshiane Navanayagam talks to two writers of romantic fiction about their passion for creating stories that end happily ever after.

Kiru Taye wanted to read stories about Africans falling in love. When she couldn’t find those books, she decided to write the stories herself. The books in her Essien series about millionaire banker brothers are international bestsellers, she also writes about crime gangs and tribal rivalry. Kiru founded the publishing firm Love Africa Press and is a co-founder of Romance Writers of Wonderful Africa, a support organisation for African romance writers.

US writer Nisha Sharma’s books have been included in 'best-of' lists by The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, Cosmopolitan, The Washington Post, Time Magazine and more. Growing up in a South Asian home she enjoyed the romantic storylines of Bollywood movies and traditional folktales like the epic Rama and Sita. Nisha joined the corporate world but quickly turned to writing Romantic Fiction and Young Adult novels too. Her books feature business mergers and re-imagine Shakespearean comedy with a South Asian twist.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

Image: (L) Kiru Taye credit Kiru Taye. (R) Nisha Sharma credit Marco Calderon.)

Rising sea levels and increasingly powerful storms are threatening coastlines, low-lying island states and coastal cities around the world. Ella Al-Shamahi talks to two women from Sri Lanka and France about how they’re using satellites to track coastal erosion and develop strategies to reduce its impact on populations.

Sarah Dole is a Sri Lankan physicist and entrepreneur leading a satellite image analysis project in the Maldives, the world’s lowest lying country, looking at the rate at which beaches erode. She co-founded Invena – a company carrying out research and helping develop technology that aims to preserve low-lying nations.

Anne-Laure Beck is a French geomatic and remote-sensing engineer. She's the EU lead on coastal erosion for the environmental consultancy Argans. They use satellite-based earth observation and geographical information systems to map and monitor environments in order to track coastal erosion and accretion to inform coastal management and protection plans.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

Image: (L) Sarah Dole credit Ali Amir @aliaerials. (R) Anne-Laure Beck credit Anne-Laure Beck.)

Less than 0.001% of the deep ocean has been explored. Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to two women from South Africa and the US who have dedicated their careers to finding out more about our planet's most uncharted depths.

Dr Katy Croff Bell is an American ocean explorer and deep-sea technologist. She has over 15 years of experience leading ground-breaking oceanographic and archaeological projects. Katy is the founder of the Ocean Discovery League, an organisation dedicated to expanding global access to deep-sea exploration by developing affordable, durable technology for scientists and researchers.

Dr Zoleka Filander is an award-winning South African marine biologist with South Africa’s Department of Fisheries, Forestry, and Environment. She leads pioneering expeditions into uncharted marine territories, gathering crucial data to inform conservation strategies. Zoleka is passionate about sharing the deep ocean’s wonders to inspire public respect and a sense of urgency for its preservation.

Produced by Emily Naylor

(Image: (L) Katy Croff Bell courtesy of Katy Croff Bell. (R) Zoleka Filander credit Logan Lambert.)

Women fusing tech and agriculture to farm food - indoors, local and soil-free

The music industry is notoriously competitive, making it difficult for artists to break through. Datshiane Navanayagam speaks to two music scouts to find out what they look for when signing musicians to their labels and how to succeed in the business.

Jane Abernethy is Managing Director at Omnian Music Group, a Brooklyn-based label group comprised of Captured Tracks, Sinderlyn and 2MR. Originally from Scotland she began her career music scouting in the UK before becoming the Director of A&R at the US label 4AD, where she signed groundbreaking artists like Grimes and contributed to the discovery of Bon Iver.

Produced by Emily Naylor and Elena Angelides

(Image: (L) Jane Abernethy credit Dan Bessini. (R) Laura Tesoriero credit Catalina Bartolome.)