Caribbean With Simon Reeve (2015) s01e03 Episode Script
Nicaragua, Honduras, Jamaica
I'm on a journey around the Caribbean Sea, with its thousands of beautiful islands.
And an incredible mainland coast, home to millions of extraordinary people.
It's a vast area spanning a million square millions, with a rich and brutal history.
And some of the most dangerous places on the planet.
(GUNFIRE) It's one of the most vibrant and exciting regions on Earth.
It's the Caribbean.
On this final leg of my journey around the Caribbean Sea, I travel from the coast of Nicaragua, north through Honduras, to finish my journey in Jamaica.
On one of the world's greatest coral reefs I join a research mission and explore the coral kingdom at night.
That was absolutely incredible.
In the deadliest city on the planet I witness the brutal results of gang warfare.
I think he's got a bullet wound on his chest.
Look at that.
Before ending my adventure Oh, my goodness.
on one of the Caribbean's most stunning beaches.
I'm just off the beautiful coast of Nicaragua and I'm beginning the third leg of my journey around the Caribbean Sea.
Nicaragua's a former Spanish colony, but the British were in this area, and many people along the Caribbean coast speak English.
A local called Harley Clair was taking me back to the area where he lives-- a village called Monkey Point.
What a beautiful-looking community.
- Who's this gentleman? Hello, sir.
- Lovely to meet you.
- Lovely to meet you, too.
How are you? - Fine.
- Are you the headman in the community? - Yeah No, no, in this area.
This area, he's the headman.
- You're the headman? You didn't say that.
- Yeah! I will be something like a big chief, you know.
In the next world, you would say the big boss.
The people here are Rama and Creole.
They're the descendants of the original tribes who inhabited this coast for thousands of years, and former slaves brought here by the British.
The community at Monkey Point have a reputation as some of the best seafarers in the area.
- Are you a community of fishermen, then? - Yes.
This is the main thing we do here, like job, you know? - Main job.
Fishing.
- Yeah, the main job is fishery.
Harley took me out to show me the ropes and give me a lesson.
- Do you want to try? - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- OK.
Grab one.
- Right.
- Again.
- Well, I don't want that bit.
- I'll have this bit.
- One.
You just have to hold-- everything you have to hold in one hand.
- No, no, no.
Let go, let go, let go.
- OK.
So, you're going to do like when you're dancing, OK? This one here.
And like when you love her.
Huh-huh-huhhh.
When you get it this way, you let go of everything.
OK, OK.
- But mind your - Stay out of the way.
- Go ahead.
Yes.
- Hide.
OK? Hooray! You did it better than I! OK Hey, have we got anything? It's baked beans again tonight.
- We've got a fish.
Dinner! - Got one fish.
- Whoa.
- Flippin' heck! What's this? This is a conger eel, man.
- A conger eel.
- It's a sea snake.
Yes.
You've caught him when he's got a fish in his mouth.
- Swallowing a fish.
- That's extraordinary.
When the fish aren't biting, life can be tough along this idyllic coastline.
However, it's a way of life that Harley and the rest of the village want to preserve.
But Nicaragua is on the brink of monumental change.
This community and the entire country could soon be split in two by the world's largest engineering project.
The government has approved plans to carve a massive canal running almost 180 miles across Nicaragua, linking the Pacific and the Caribbean.
One end of it will be right by Monkey Point.
During the past 500 years, the British, Spanish, Dutch, French and the Americans have all dreamt or tried to join the two oceans through Nicaragua.
There have been more than 70 attempts, but they've all failed.
- This is part of an old train.
Yes.
- No! Part of a steam engine, I'm guessing.
Yeah.
In the beginning of the 19th century, maybe they was trying to construct a dry canal and it was going along the way to the Pacific.
So, this engine dates back to one of the many attempts to link the Pacific and the Caribbean sides of Nicaragua.
In this case, as you said, for a dry canal, - so running railway tracks across the country.
- Yeah.
There have been so many attempts in one form or another to do this over the years, haven't there? - Dozens of them.
- So, it can happen again.
This time, a Chinese-backed consortium have been granted the right to build a channel a third of a mile wide to rival the neighbouring Panama Canal.
The Nicaraguan Interoceanic Canal will take supertankers and a new generation of giant container ships that won't fit through the 100-year-old Panama Canal.
The £32 billion Nicaraguan scheme was approved without a public consultation and with very little debate.
And, of course, the project will have a colossal impact on the environment.
Look at this.
Within just a few feet, we are in this extraordinary forest.
It's beautiful.
Hundreds of thousands of acres of wetlands and forests like this will need to be cleared to make way for the canal.
It will take away the habitat of creatures that are already endangered.
I think they might just end up destroying a huge area of pristine wilderness.
The Interoceanic Canal will divide Nicaragua.
Communities living near the canal will be changed for ever.
Can we ask some of you here what your view is about the canal? Nobody has come here and said to you, - "This is what's going to happen"? - No.
No.
- No-one? - No.
What's happened, we hear it on the news.
We put on the radio and we hear it.
They not even take the kindness and inform us in our language what's going to take place on the radio broadcasting station.
It doesn't sound as though you think the canal will really benefit your people.
Look, I love my community, how it sits.
And tomorrow, I see just drastically my community change, and probably everything cut down, you know? - I think - That's the future you see for you community here? - Yes.
Yes.
- Of a devastated living on a devastated land? The Nicaraguan people look at us around here, look at indigenous and African descendants, like, oh, we're like second-class people.
We would be, like, having our girl, young girls, like, prostituting, and for a man, doing the worstest of the job to get some food to carry home for the children, you know? So, you think that if jobs do come to you from the canal that they'll be very basic jobs and there'll be enormous problems with social problems like prostitution as well as a result? Yeah, yeah.
Totally.
Totally change.
Totally change.
It's going to be a new Nearly like being a new life, almost.
- Yeah.
- Going to be like a new life we're going to have.
Tens of thousands of people will need to be resettled away from the canal.
But new laws mean people displaced by the project will receive just minimal compensation for their homes.
Phew, what a long day.
And it's the room on the right.
And there's beds.
(WAVES CRASH) That's all right.
I think I'll bag this one.
By the sound of it, I'll have a great sea view in the morning.
The canal is an enormous project, but ordinary people in Nicaragua have been left out of the decision-making process.
There's been nothing like a pesky public inquiry here.
So, the future for Monkey Point and for Harley looks very uncertain.
- Farewell to Harley.
- All right, brother.
- Stay safe, all right? Good luck.
- Thank you.
Thank you.
- And good luck to you, too.
- Thank you, Harley.
Bye-bye, mate.
Let's head north along the Caribbean coast.
With no roads into or out of Monkey Point, the only way to travel is by boat.
It's a bit choppy, and it's about to get worse.
It was a hair-raising three-hour journey up the coast to the town of Bluefields.
Bluefields is a middle-of-nowhere place, but it's also the only port of any size on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, and it's likely to be an operation, supply and logistics base for the canal.
Oh.
Ohh! Dry land.
I'm going to get the stuff off the boat and then I think we're going to go and have a cup of tea.
Nicaragua's the second poorest country in the western hemisphere, after Haiti.
Half of the six million people here scrape by on around a dollar a day.
And the Caribbean region is the poorest part of the country.
Eight out of ten people in this town are unemployed.
Oh, gracias.
Enjoy.
And this, actually, is really interesting.
This is an address given by the wife of the national leader, President Ortega.
Apparently, almost every day she takes over the TV airwaves and broadcasts to the nation.
There's eight national TV stations here and seven are reportedly owned by the President's family and friends.
The First Lady uses her weekday address to promote government policies and projects like the new canal.
Is she on every day? Does she talk about the canal? The President said if the canal come out positive, there will be jobs for a lot of families.
That's the key for you, is it, that it'll bring jobs to the people here? Bring jobs for the people here in the region.
Because that is what we need-- jobs.
So, you think the canal could transform life here? - Super-transform it.
- Super-transform? Super-transform.
Thank you.
The food was lovely.
President Daniel Ortega was a hero of the 1979 revolution which overthrew an American-backed dictatorship that had ruled here for more than 40 years.
- All right, lads? - Yeah.
He then battled the Contras, American-backed guerrillas.
But now Ortega's dogged by allegations of corruption.
He's said to be one of the richest men in the country, yet his government claims the canal will bring an economic boom to this poor nation.
I went to meet Johnny Hodgson, a member of Ortega's ruling Sandinista Party.
Johnny, what's your view about the proposed canal? Do you think it will? Presumably, coming from the ruling party, you think it's going to benefit the country? Yes, I am convinced of that.
It is a historical aspiration for the people of the Caribbean coast to have something that can generate jobs, you know, jobs for the people to make a living.
It's an income that they will get for ever, you know? So long as we have the canal and it is working, the people will be getting these incomes.
Let's let these Oh! People have got their daily chores to do.
- Yes, and the streets are very narrow.
- Yes, indeed.
You call this a street.
It's interesting.
Yes, this is the way of getting to places, isn't it? - You see how a lot of things need to be changed.
- Yes.
But we don't have we don't have the money.
We need investment.
Our main objective is to escape from poverty and we are searching for that opportunity, and we think we find it.
The cost of the canal will be more than three times the size of the Nicaraguan economy.
It's a huge investment, but not everyone here thinks they'll see the benefits.
Where are you from, sir? From Britain.
- Eh? - Britain.
Where is that? - Well, England is part of Britain.
- OK.
I like Chelsea, you know? - Chelsea?! - Yeah.
That's what you know about England, is football.
The Premier League.
You understand? How is business for you here in Bluefields? - Yeah, well, not so good, you know? - What are we doing? The money is very hard.
Who's this? So, we were just asking, before you stopped to pick up another passenger, what is your view about the canal? - Do you think it's a good idea or a bad idea? - No, no, no.
Why? Why? So, you think the people who will work on the canal won't be they won't be Nicaraguan, they'll be foreigners? He has a point.
Few Nicaraguans work as civil engineers and the consortium behind the canal project is apparently planning to import up to 50,000 Chinese labourers to build it.
Bye-bye, madam.
Oh, great.
Small airport, no queue.
To continue my journey around the Caribbean coast, I flew north across Honduras to the island of Roatan.
35 miles from the Honduran mainland, Roatan is the country's most popular tourist destination.
So, we're on an island off the coast of Honduras in the Caribbean Sea.
Visitors flock here from Europe and North America for a taste of the Caribbean and the chance to get into the water.
This was home to the original "Pirates of the Caribbean".
By the mid-17th century, it's thought that were about 5,000 pirates based on the island.
You would not want to be sailing past them.
I was here to see a huge coral reef, the jewel of the Caribbean.
Dr.
Steve Box is a marine scientist working for the Smithsonian Institute.
Steve, what is so special about this place? The Mesoamerican Reef is the second largest barrier reef in the world, so it's very, very important.
And for the Caribbean, it's an incredible extension of reef systems spanning four countries.
- The second largest barrier reef on planet Earth is here.
- Yes, it is.
In the Caribbean.
And we're going to dive on it? We're going to dive on the southern extent of it.
The Mesoamerican Reef stretches 600 miles around the Caribbean Sea from Mexico to these Honduran islands.
As remarkable as Australia's Great Barrier Reef, it's like visiting another world.
It's home to more than 60 types of coral that provide habitat and food for more than 500 species of fish.
But in just the last few decades, half the reef's coral has been wiped out.
Like reefs across the tropics, pollution, overfishing and climate change are all killing this critical ecosystem.
It was upsetting to see mountains of dead coral.
However, some areas of reef here still have the highest concentrations of live coral found anywhere on the Mesoamerican Reef.
Steve has been investigating why and his research is focused on the likely saviour-- the parrotfish.
Parrotfish can grow to four foot long.
They're the largest herbivorous fish in the entire Caribbean.
Scientists have discovered that areas with healthy populations of parrotfish are better able to survive the problems affecting reefs elsewhere.
It is so still and the visibility is just incredible down there.
And we could see schools of little parrotfish.
I don't think I've ever seen that before.
It's a fundamental function on the reef for those parrotfish to be taking the algae out of the way.
So, they're like a team of cleaners.
Kind of like a flock of sheep moving around, taking the algae off the reef.
Keeping the grass short.
Keeping the grass short and allowing everything else to grow up around it.
Steve thinks the parrotfish is absolutely essential to the health of the coral reef.
He's trying to learn more about their behaviour to work out how best to protect them.
To do that, Steve's taking samples from parrotfish to track their movement around the Caribbean.
The best time to catch and study them is at night.
The parrotfish, when we see them during the day, they're up in and the reef, which actually makes them really hard to catch.
Whereas at night, they go and find a nice little crevice to fall asleep in.
And so we're going to go down with the torches, look for where we see them sleeping.
And once we find them, we will then move them into the net.
- In the dark.
Under the sea.
- In the dark.
I've never done a night dive.
- Is this going to be a tricky procedure? - It could be, yes.
- It's going to be exciting.
- Great! It'll be fun.
- It'll be fun.
It's an eerie experience to dive into blackness, but also completely magical.
Finding the sleeping parrotfish was surprisingly easy.
When he'd caught one in the net, Steve took clippings from parrotfish fins to collect their DNA.
The fins grow back and the fish are unharmed.
Steve's team are building a DNA database that's already uncovering the secret life of the parrotfish.
They're revealing that many of the parrotfish floated here as larvae on ocean currents from reefs hundreds of miles away.
So, Steve's research shows us that to save the Mesoamerican Reef, marine-protected areas need to span the region.
His work is helping to persuade Caribbean nations to set up national parks in the sea and ban fishing practices that harm parrotfish.
That was absolutely incredible.
Aagh! The colours are just so vibrant.
- A bag of water.
- Goldfish.
A bag of water with this tiny fin clip.
- That's all we need.
- That's it? It's amazing to be able to work out in the field like this and then take these tiny, tiny samples back and be able to do such amazing science.
Hopefully, what you're doing is going to make a really profound positive difference to life in our seas.
There are 100,000 people living on the island of Roatan.
This is a slightly different side of the island.
Many of them moved here to escape violence and crime on the mainland of Honduras.
I went to see someone who had fled here to work.
Buenos días.
So, this is Delores.
Delores has a tortilla stand.
Show me how to make tortillas.
Oh, OK.
IN TRANSLATION: You've got a couple there.
Look what's happening.
They're burning! Delores, those tortillas don't look healthy.
Let's make more.
I reckon I can get through a good half a dozen of these.
Delores, are you from the island, or are you from the mainland? So, how dangerous, how violent, was the neighbourhood you were living in? So, you came here because you were worried, you were terrified that the gangs were going to force your son to become a gang member.
And what would've happened if he'd refused? Delores and her son escaped from the mainland with little more than they could carry.
The gang took over their house.
As far as Delores knows, they're still there today.
- How are you doing? Gracias.
- Fine, thank you.
I was embarking on the most difficult and dangerous part of my journey around the Caribbean.
I took a ferry to the Honduran mainland.
The country is under attack by gangs and drug cartels, and it now has the highest murder rate on the planet.
This is probably the most violent country I've been to outside an actual warzone.
- Hello.
- How are you, mate? - Simon.
- Renato.
Hello, mate.
Ah.
Renato Lacayo had agreed to be my guide for the rest of my journey through Honduras.
A few bits and pieces here.
Flak jackets and everything.
Honduras has endured almost 300 conflicts, rebellions and changes of government.
It's the original banana republic.
Until the mid-20th century, foreign banana corporations dominated the country and helped to keep it poor.
Honduras has since suffered military rule, natural disasters and, now, violent crime.
It's actually much lighter outside than it appears from in here.
For safety reasons, for security reasons, the vehicle we're in has got heavily tinted windows and even windscreen as well.
It means people can't see there's foreigners in the vehicle.
Renato brought us the newspapers.
There's just page after page about crimes and murders.
This is very much everyday news.
It's normal for us because we're used to seeing the same headlines every day, just different faces.
Are you scared of what's happening here? Do you get frightened? You can't help but be afraid.
People you know have had a brother killed, they've had their father killed.
And it just seems like it's catching on, it's adding up, and at sometime, it'll catch up to you or your family, and that's a really frightening feeling.
It's not surprising Renato's worried.
Across Honduras, there's almost one murder every hour.
We headed to the city of San Pedro Sula.
It's the deadliest city on the planet.
We've arrived in San Pedro Sula.
This isn't a great time to be driving around, so we're going to find a hotel and then tomorrow, in daylight, we'll have a look around.
San Pedro Sula is Honduras's second city, home to just over a million people.
It looks pretty normal, but violent drug gangs are at war here.
We're going into one of the most dangerous neighbourhoods in one of the most dangerous cities in the world, so we need to wear body armour.
Almost 1 in 500 people are being murdered here each year.
The police force is corrupt and unable to stem the violence, so the military are being sent in to confront the gangs and reclaim no-go areas.
There's three military police officers patrolling just by the side of the road there.
They're clearly really trying to project their force into this city.
We were going on patrol with the military police as they went into a poor gang-controlled area of the city called Chamelecon.
I think it's astonishing that these are the lengths we have to go to be secure going into one of the neighbourhoods in this city.
(DOG BARKS) This is an extraordinary situation.
We've got, what, 20 heavily armed soldiers and officers around us.
There's a bloke with a balaclava who clearly doesn't want his face seen.
The country's two main gangs have fought to control this neighbourhood for years, using brutal tactics, including extortion, torture and murder.
Colonel, what does this mean? IN TRANSLATION: What sort of size a gang is MS-13? There are thought to be 300,000 gang members in Central America.
MS-13's the biggest gang.
It has close ties with Mexican drug cartels.
It's just completely bare now, except for a rather sad toilet there.
If you don't leave, we're going to kill you-- that's what they say.
And people get scared.
They'll just pick up their stuff, anything they can, and just leave.
We just want your home, what, to use to sell drugs or for somebody to live in, or either/or? And they also use them to commit crimes.
They call them crazy houses.
They come into people's homes, they push you out and then they use it to torture people.
Hundreds of homes have been abandoned in this area.
There are more than 110,000 gang members in Honduras.
They're tearing the country apart.
To combat the gangs, the military police mount regular patrols and set up checkpoints.
What are you looking for when you do a stop like this? IN TRANSLATION: Tattoos often indicate gang membership.
Under zero tolerance rules, if the police find a tattoo, these boys face arrest.
I think he's got a bullet wound on his chest, look at that.
Huge quantities of cocaine for use in North America are trafficked through Honduras.
So, it's almost inevitable that that's going to result in spectacular rates of violence here.
For me, Honduras and Hondurans are victims of America's demand for drugs.
The main cause of the war here is drugs.
Estimates vary, but up to £30 billion-worth of cocaine is believed to pass through Honduras on the way to the US each year.
How bad did things get? IN TRANSLATION: There are some signs the military are bringing a degree of security to this neighbourhood.
But they're far from winning the war.
(SIREN BLARES) A few hours later, we got a call saying there'd been an incident on the outskirts of the city.
We raced to the scene.
¡Prensa, prensa! Commissioner, can you tell us what's happened? IN TRANSLATION: Two police officers have been targeted? It's like a it's like an assassination.
51 police officers have been killed in this area? Yes, that's right.
That is unbelievable.
Are things getting better or worse here? It'll take a long time for things to get better.
This is The wounds are so deep.
You spoke to the workers from the morgue, I believe.
Did they say how many bodies they've collected today? They've collected eight bodies already-- seven homicides and one suicide.
- Seven murders in one day.
- In one day.
And it's still 9 o'clock at night, so we could have more.
These are the consequences of the drugs trade-- violence, corruption and a failing state.
There was only one way to meet the gangs tearing Honduras apart.
We're now going to what's said to be the headquarters for many of the gangs.
We're going into the city's prison.
It's said the most powerful gangs are now being run from inside these walls.
The prison's packed with more than 2,500 inmates, but it's not exactly a normal jail.
Buenas tardes.
The guards here just control the perimeter.
It's a dangerous place and I wasn't sure what would happen inside.
Flippin' heck! So, the gentleman in the white shirt there, he's the Bishop of San Pedro Sula.
We just had a quick chat and a meeting with him.
He is helping us Well, he is facilitating us being here.
He is effectively going to be our security, we think, in some parts of the prison.
Being with him will hopefully guarantee that we are safe.
Bishop Emiliani commands respect in areas of the prison where the guards don't usually go.
The bishops try to broker a truce between the government and the two most notorious street gangs in Honduras.
OK, we're about to enter the 18th Street area of the prison and the Monsignor is taking us inside.
The 18th Street gang has a brutal reputation.
As in the rest of the prison, the guards have given over control of this area to the prisoners themselves.
- Chief of the gangs? - Yes, yes.
(HE SPEAKS SPANISH) They want us to put the cameras down.
Cameras down.
After some negotiation, the gangsters allowed us inside their wing.
Families were visiting and there were no guards in sight.
It was astonishing.
Leaders of the 18th Street agreed to talk on condition we didn't show their faces.
IN TRANSLATION: The bishop says the 18th Street gang and its rivals, MS-13, agreed to the terms of a truce more than a year ago, but the Honduran government is refusing to discuss or negotiate.
Meanwhile, the violence continues.
The bishop took me to another wing to meet a reformed gang member.
We've got barbed wire, razor wire, around us.
There's a guard up above.
OK? IN TRANSLATION: Monsignor, how can we understand this? The gangs will take children as young as eight years old.
IN TRANSLATION: Honduras is a beautiful Caribbean country stuck between the drug producers of South America and the drug consumers to the north.
Its location means the government's fighting a losing battle against organised gangs and drug cartels.
Gracias, señores.
(THEY RESPOND IN SPANISH) The bishop took me away from the gang wings.
As we headed towards the guards at the gate, we entered the main area of the prison.
Here we have Here are the people working.
Wow.
This is incredible.
You can see there's shoe soles here being cut out.
There's some people up here working away.
I was still inside the jail.
The inmates are in control here.
Everybody is working, everybody's doing something.
They hand out the food, keep keys to the cells and decide who gets a decent bed or a punishment.
It felt like a combination of sweatshop and market, with cafes and shops.
This is astonishing.
- This is like a town.
- Yes.
Yes, like a town.
Yes.
Apparently, there is 80% employment inside the prison.
That's not only impressive in most countries, it's a hell of a lot higher than it is outside in the rest of Honduras.
Everyone was busy, but this isn't a safe zone.
One of the prisoners in charge here reportedly took control after beheading his predecessor and feeding his heart to a dog.
I have never seen anything like this.
We're inside a prison.
I have to keep telling myself that.
Despite the turmoil created by hundreds of murderers and criminals being thrown together in a tiny space, there's a bizarre sense of order inside the prison.
It only highlights the failure of the Honduran state outside.
Gracias, señor.
We all felt a huge sense of relief when we made it back safe and sound to the main gate.
(HE SIGHS) My God, that was That was a very intense and rather overwhelming experience.
It's very hard to really convey anything but a fraction of the incredible sights and sounds and senses that you experience in a situation like that.
The problems facing Honduras haven't developed overnight.
And until the river of cocaine flowing through here is stopped, it's hard to see an end to the violence.
I headed on to the last stop on my journey around the Caribbean Sea, the island of Jamaica.
It was somewhere I'd always wanted to go.
And I was hoping to learn a bit more about Jamaica than Rastas and reggae.
The Caribbean is a place of real extremes.
The crazy situation in Honduras and just extraordinary, raw, magnificent beauty here.
Morning! I'm meeting a bloke called Nick at this restaurant.
Oh, right, very funny, yes.
I was told I was meeting him in a blue boat.
Nick, hello.
Blue boat on the left.
I mean, how can you get that wrong? - Simon Reeve.
- Pleasure.
Pleasure.
Lovely to meet you.
How are you doing? Nick, what are you doing here? Your accent's not exactly local, is it? Originally from Derby.
My parents decided that they were going to move back here when I was about 16 or 17.
- I came back.
- So, they're from Jamaica? They're from here.
I've discovered the Jamaica they spoke about, the place which they talked about when I was growing up.
And that's been a surprise, a discovery? Revelation? You know what's been a real revelation to me? So, my parents were always like, you know, Jamaica, it's home, blah-blah-blah.
I get here and people are like, "Yo, you come from foreign.
" Sorry about my bad patois to all the people who can actually speak it.
But, you know, basically, "Do you come from abroad?" And it was like, "What, really?" Nick had suggested meeting here because locals are dealing with a problem that's affecting much of Jamaica and the entire Caribbean.
- What are they doing down there? Can we go and have a look? - Yeah.
They're building gabion baskets, just wire mesh and rocks.
That's what they hope will kind of keep back the water.
That's pretty makeshift, isn't it? 50 feet of this beach has disappeared underwater in just six years, and like communities across the entire region, people here are fighting to save their homes and businesses.
I mean, this sort of situation gets worse when you have storms.
And for many years, you know, especially my dad's generation, you know, they had a big storm in the '50s and they never had a big one until the '80s.
Now, you fast forward in recent years, there's been storm after storm after storm after storm.
And the beach just doesn't have time to regenerate or to basically just get back to normal.
You know, people are doing whatever they can, you know, to try and stop this happening.
Something is going wrong in the tropics.
The weather is changing.
And it's often not wealthy people who are suffering as a result, but poorer communities like this.
Our changing climate is already having a significant impact around the coast of Jamaica.
Scientists are warning that climate change will cause more storms and hurricanes around the region.
That's one of a number of problems plaguing this small nation.
It's a fabulous place to come for a holiday, but for locals, life here is still tough.
20% life in poverty and the country has one of the highest national debts in the world.
- Nick, where are we going? - So, we're heading to Source Farm.
Issues like high crime, unemployment and economic mismanagement have led many of the brightest and best Jamaicans to emigrate, mostly to the US.
It's called the brain drain and it's a huge problem across the Caribbean.
But Nick was taking me to meet a family who, like his, have returned to the island after living and working abroad.
Oh, right, here we are.
This is it.
Nicola Phillips sold her restaurant in Philadelphia and moved back home to set up Source Farm.
- This is Simon.
- Hello.
Simon Reeve.
Lovely to meet you.
- Welcome.
She came back with her brother, a qualified horticulturist, her mum, a trained nurse, and her sister, who's a teacher.
They brought their families and now there's a community of 25 people living here.
It sounds like you've all come back bringing skills into your family, but into the wider community as well.
We just want more people to be able to think that you can actually come back and make a difference.
How lucky are you, Mum, to have everybody here? I don't call it luck.
I think I'm blessed.
The debate in Western countries about immigration concentrates on the effect it has on us.
But emigration's a shocking cost to countries like Jamaica which has lost 85% of university educated workers.
However, the Phillips clan have come back to teach local farmers and help this heavily indebted country.
We have all these wonderful microclimates that we can grow almost anything.
We were built on agriculture in terms of, you know, historically, and we should be looking back to agriculture as a way to get ourselves out of debt.
That's an idyllic scene.
And sea behind.
It's a beautiful space to work.
One of the things that we do is that we don't put a crop in the ground unless we know where we have a market for it.
We are going to be very selective, cos it's a business.
But we also have the opportunity to bring in the tech stuff.
It's not just the same old thing that maybe grandpa did alone, but we need to integrate the technology that we have as well.
You've got, obviously, a passionate desire - to feed Jamaica and Jamaicans - Yes.
combined with spreadsheets to make sure all the numbers add up.
Yes, it always has to add up! Jamaica imports nearly a billion dollars' worth of food a year, and it needs to come up with ideas that encourage talented people to stay in the country.
So, Nicola's project couldn't be more important.
The next morning, Nick took me to the capital-- Kingston.
In recent decades, Jamaica's developed a reputation for violence, crime and corruption.
That's part of the reason so many locals have gone to live and work abroad.
But there's some good news-- the crime rate here is actually going down.
Just a few years ago, Jamaica was sliding into something of an abyss.
The murder rate here was rising uncontrollably to levels only seen in a country like Honduras.
But since then, it's started to turn a corner.
Jamaica's murder rate has fallen by 40% in recent years.
Cases of rape are down by a quarter.
A recent report stated Jamaica used to be one of the most corrupt countries in the entire Americas.
Now it's one of the least.
Jamaica has got a long way to go with reducing down levels of crime, and corruption as well.
It's actually doing better than many neighbouring countries.
Things are improving here.
- Inspector.
Simon Reeve.
- Hi, Simon.
- Very nice to meet you.
- Hello, sir.
- Ainsworth.
Simon Reeve.
Nice to meet you.
Inspector Ainsworth Shakes.
He's the chief polygrapher.
- The chief polygrapher? - Yes.
Goodness me.
You've looked into people's souls.
Oh, yeah, I like that.
(ALL LAUGH) Corrupt politicians, officials and policemen hold back so many countries that I visit.
Finally, it was a joy to see an agency and a government doing something about them.
This elite squad is tackling white-collar corruption and money laundering.
These are the unsung heroes who crunch the figure and follow the leads and the tracks and go through those complex investigations.
Our focus is on the major players, the kingpins, those persons who have amassed a lot of wealth, those persons who have reached controlled wealth and can fund their illicit lifestyle and other criminal activities.
Now the Jamaica authorities are going after hundreds of millions of pounds' worth of criminal assets.
The motto of this agency is, "no-one's above the law".
- Have a seat right there, please.
- Goodness.
The video here, CCTV.
Least of all, me.
We have here the cardio cuff.
It looks at changes in your heart rate as you are polygraphed.
Now I'm going to give you one of these cards.
- On the underside, there's a number.
Don't let me see it.
- OK.
Each time I ask you if you had picked a number, I want you to answer "No", - even when I ask you the number you have under your hand.
- I see.
Did you pick the number 16? No.
Did you pick the number 15? No.
Did you pick the number 7? No.
Did you pick the number 8? No.
And open your eyes.
This instrument is indicating that you have the number 8 under your hand.
So, now I know what it looks like when you're lying, right? (HE CHUCKLES) - All right.
- That's an ominous laugh, Inspector.
(HE CHUCKLES) Oh, yes.
What the polygraph does, if there's any deviation from the truth, any deviation, there will be a reaction to the question.
Who do you get in here? The bulk of our examinees have been police officers, because one of our major problems here in Jamaica has been corruption.
- And a number - Police corruption? - Police corruption, I can tell you.
There are persons who have come here and they've given us 99.
9% of the truth, which is still a lie.
So, our job is to get 100% of the truth out.
Why is tackling corruption so important? It's important because corruption has one, it has tarnished the image of the Jamaican Constabulary Force, it has tarnished the image of Jamaica.
It has depleted our economy.
It has driven investors away.
We realise that we have a job to do and we're going to do whatever it takes to tackle corruption, to tackle criminality.
And this is just one of the tools that we are going to use.
By polygraphing cops and officials, Jamaica's strengthening all of its key public institutions.
That means better policing and public services.
Jamaica's emerging as a rare success story in the battle against crime in the Caribbean.
The results are also being felt on the streets.
Nick took me into a tough Kingston neighbourhood called Southside.
Once upon a time, you'd talk about Southside, it was only known for gang culture.
Now people are coming in, people are coming into the community.
There are little restaurants opening.
And things like that, they wouldn't have happened before.
So, now, slowly but surely, this kind of community, it's reinventing itself, and that makes a huge difference to people who live here.
Nick had arranged for us to meet a man with first-hand experience of Southside before life began to improve.
Narado Bell was a feared gangster and enforcer.
Were you armed? Were you carrying a gun? - Mm-hm.
- Oh, yes, you're saying.
- Is that how it was? - Yeah.
That's how.
Kill or be killed.
What was the moment for you when you thought, "This has got to stop"? Narado took us to see a project that he believes helped turn both his fortunes and the fortunes of his community around.
To tackle crime, you have to tackle poverty, you have to give youngsters an alternative.
Jamaica's Citizen Security Justice Programme works with people from troubled areas, giving them an opportunity to learn a trade and get a job.
Yes, it's on-the-job skills training, and what's important about this aspect of it is that we are seeking to improve their employability skills as well as their technical skills.
Who are they and where have they come from? From some of our most volatile communities.
Where there's a lot of crime, a lot of violence.
Lots of crime, lots of violence.
- And a lot of unemployment.
- And high unemployment.
And we do have a motto here, that we say, if you come as a chicken, you leave as an eagle! - That's good.
You like that.
- Yes, I do! The project gives people skills and purpose.
It's a whole raft of measures and it's had astonishing results.
Violent crime in some areas where it's running has fallen by almost 70%.
Gangsters have been completely reformed.
- That's good work.
- Yeah, that's a beam.
That's a good weld.
- Using the concave motion.
- Using the concave motion.
I would be unfamiliar with that, but I can see it's a good weld.
Narado used to carry a gun.
Now he's a qualified welder and certified to instruct even the most hopeless student.
You're travelling too fast.
Slow that down.
Go, move, move with it.
OK.
That was really rubbish.
You're going to have to chip it all off and start again.
Could the old you have ever imagined - that the new you would be doing this? - No, never.
Never.
And what's really lovely to see is the pride you've got in your work as well.
And you're a really good teacher.
Get you! Jamaica's showing that it is possible to tackle even appalling rates of crime.
But to do that, you have to go after the big fish in parliament or the police force, as well as giving street criminals an alternative and a future.
I was coming to the end of my adventure.
What had surprised me most were the utter extremes of life I'd seen around the Caribbean from Barbados to Honduras, and from Haiti to Venezuela.
When we were first talking about making this journey around the Caribbean region, I never imagined for one moment I would find myself on the gang wing of a Honduran prison or hunting venomous fish or going up in the sky in a flying dinghy.
It's been incredible.
I ended my journey the same way I began.
On a beautiful Caribbean beach.
This is a region with serious problems with poverty and corruption, and there are enormous environmental challenges here.
But they're not insurmountable.
And this place is home to some of the warmest people on the planet.
And I'm finishing my journey in a time-honoured way.
For me, anyway.
Getting my boots wet.
It's the Caribbean! April 5th, 2015
And an incredible mainland coast, home to millions of extraordinary people.
It's a vast area spanning a million square millions, with a rich and brutal history.
And some of the most dangerous places on the planet.
(GUNFIRE) It's one of the most vibrant and exciting regions on Earth.
It's the Caribbean.
On this final leg of my journey around the Caribbean Sea, I travel from the coast of Nicaragua, north through Honduras, to finish my journey in Jamaica.
On one of the world's greatest coral reefs I join a research mission and explore the coral kingdom at night.
That was absolutely incredible.
In the deadliest city on the planet I witness the brutal results of gang warfare.
I think he's got a bullet wound on his chest.
Look at that.
Before ending my adventure Oh, my goodness.
on one of the Caribbean's most stunning beaches.
I'm just off the beautiful coast of Nicaragua and I'm beginning the third leg of my journey around the Caribbean Sea.
Nicaragua's a former Spanish colony, but the British were in this area, and many people along the Caribbean coast speak English.
A local called Harley Clair was taking me back to the area where he lives-- a village called Monkey Point.
What a beautiful-looking community.
- Who's this gentleman? Hello, sir.
- Lovely to meet you.
- Lovely to meet you, too.
How are you? - Fine.
- Are you the headman in the community? - Yeah No, no, in this area.
This area, he's the headman.
- You're the headman? You didn't say that.
- Yeah! I will be something like a big chief, you know.
In the next world, you would say the big boss.
The people here are Rama and Creole.
They're the descendants of the original tribes who inhabited this coast for thousands of years, and former slaves brought here by the British.
The community at Monkey Point have a reputation as some of the best seafarers in the area.
- Are you a community of fishermen, then? - Yes.
This is the main thing we do here, like job, you know? - Main job.
Fishing.
- Yeah, the main job is fishery.
Harley took me out to show me the ropes and give me a lesson.
- Do you want to try? - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- OK.
Grab one.
- Right.
- Again.
- Well, I don't want that bit.
- I'll have this bit.
- One.
You just have to hold-- everything you have to hold in one hand.
- No, no, no.
Let go, let go, let go.
- OK.
So, you're going to do like when you're dancing, OK? This one here.
And like when you love her.
Huh-huh-huhhh.
When you get it this way, you let go of everything.
OK, OK.
- But mind your - Stay out of the way.
- Go ahead.
Yes.
- Hide.
OK? Hooray! You did it better than I! OK Hey, have we got anything? It's baked beans again tonight.
- We've got a fish.
Dinner! - Got one fish.
- Whoa.
- Flippin' heck! What's this? This is a conger eel, man.
- A conger eel.
- It's a sea snake.
Yes.
You've caught him when he's got a fish in his mouth.
- Swallowing a fish.
- That's extraordinary.
When the fish aren't biting, life can be tough along this idyllic coastline.
However, it's a way of life that Harley and the rest of the village want to preserve.
But Nicaragua is on the brink of monumental change.
This community and the entire country could soon be split in two by the world's largest engineering project.
The government has approved plans to carve a massive canal running almost 180 miles across Nicaragua, linking the Pacific and the Caribbean.
One end of it will be right by Monkey Point.
During the past 500 years, the British, Spanish, Dutch, French and the Americans have all dreamt or tried to join the two oceans through Nicaragua.
There have been more than 70 attempts, but they've all failed.
- This is part of an old train.
Yes.
- No! Part of a steam engine, I'm guessing.
Yeah.
In the beginning of the 19th century, maybe they was trying to construct a dry canal and it was going along the way to the Pacific.
So, this engine dates back to one of the many attempts to link the Pacific and the Caribbean sides of Nicaragua.
In this case, as you said, for a dry canal, - so running railway tracks across the country.
- Yeah.
There have been so many attempts in one form or another to do this over the years, haven't there? - Dozens of them.
- So, it can happen again.
This time, a Chinese-backed consortium have been granted the right to build a channel a third of a mile wide to rival the neighbouring Panama Canal.
The Nicaraguan Interoceanic Canal will take supertankers and a new generation of giant container ships that won't fit through the 100-year-old Panama Canal.
The £32 billion Nicaraguan scheme was approved without a public consultation and with very little debate.
And, of course, the project will have a colossal impact on the environment.
Look at this.
Within just a few feet, we are in this extraordinary forest.
It's beautiful.
Hundreds of thousands of acres of wetlands and forests like this will need to be cleared to make way for the canal.
It will take away the habitat of creatures that are already endangered.
I think they might just end up destroying a huge area of pristine wilderness.
The Interoceanic Canal will divide Nicaragua.
Communities living near the canal will be changed for ever.
Can we ask some of you here what your view is about the canal? Nobody has come here and said to you, - "This is what's going to happen"? - No.
No.
- No-one? - No.
What's happened, we hear it on the news.
We put on the radio and we hear it.
They not even take the kindness and inform us in our language what's going to take place on the radio broadcasting station.
It doesn't sound as though you think the canal will really benefit your people.
Look, I love my community, how it sits.
And tomorrow, I see just drastically my community change, and probably everything cut down, you know? - I think - That's the future you see for you community here? - Yes.
Yes.
- Of a devastated living on a devastated land? The Nicaraguan people look at us around here, look at indigenous and African descendants, like, oh, we're like second-class people.
We would be, like, having our girl, young girls, like, prostituting, and for a man, doing the worstest of the job to get some food to carry home for the children, you know? So, you think that if jobs do come to you from the canal that they'll be very basic jobs and there'll be enormous problems with social problems like prostitution as well as a result? Yeah, yeah.
Totally.
Totally change.
Totally change.
It's going to be a new Nearly like being a new life, almost.
- Yeah.
- Going to be like a new life we're going to have.
Tens of thousands of people will need to be resettled away from the canal.
But new laws mean people displaced by the project will receive just minimal compensation for their homes.
Phew, what a long day.
And it's the room on the right.
And there's beds.
(WAVES CRASH) That's all right.
I think I'll bag this one.
By the sound of it, I'll have a great sea view in the morning.
The canal is an enormous project, but ordinary people in Nicaragua have been left out of the decision-making process.
There's been nothing like a pesky public inquiry here.
So, the future for Monkey Point and for Harley looks very uncertain.
- Farewell to Harley.
- All right, brother.
- Stay safe, all right? Good luck.
- Thank you.
Thank you.
- And good luck to you, too.
- Thank you, Harley.
Bye-bye, mate.
Let's head north along the Caribbean coast.
With no roads into or out of Monkey Point, the only way to travel is by boat.
It's a bit choppy, and it's about to get worse.
It was a hair-raising three-hour journey up the coast to the town of Bluefields.
Bluefields is a middle-of-nowhere place, but it's also the only port of any size on Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, and it's likely to be an operation, supply and logistics base for the canal.
Oh.
Ohh! Dry land.
I'm going to get the stuff off the boat and then I think we're going to go and have a cup of tea.
Nicaragua's the second poorest country in the western hemisphere, after Haiti.
Half of the six million people here scrape by on around a dollar a day.
And the Caribbean region is the poorest part of the country.
Eight out of ten people in this town are unemployed.
Oh, gracias.
Enjoy.
And this, actually, is really interesting.
This is an address given by the wife of the national leader, President Ortega.
Apparently, almost every day she takes over the TV airwaves and broadcasts to the nation.
There's eight national TV stations here and seven are reportedly owned by the President's family and friends.
The First Lady uses her weekday address to promote government policies and projects like the new canal.
Is she on every day? Does she talk about the canal? The President said if the canal come out positive, there will be jobs for a lot of families.
That's the key for you, is it, that it'll bring jobs to the people here? Bring jobs for the people here in the region.
Because that is what we need-- jobs.
So, you think the canal could transform life here? - Super-transform it.
- Super-transform? Super-transform.
Thank you.
The food was lovely.
President Daniel Ortega was a hero of the 1979 revolution which overthrew an American-backed dictatorship that had ruled here for more than 40 years.
- All right, lads? - Yeah.
He then battled the Contras, American-backed guerrillas.
But now Ortega's dogged by allegations of corruption.
He's said to be one of the richest men in the country, yet his government claims the canal will bring an economic boom to this poor nation.
I went to meet Johnny Hodgson, a member of Ortega's ruling Sandinista Party.
Johnny, what's your view about the proposed canal? Do you think it will? Presumably, coming from the ruling party, you think it's going to benefit the country? Yes, I am convinced of that.
It is a historical aspiration for the people of the Caribbean coast to have something that can generate jobs, you know, jobs for the people to make a living.
It's an income that they will get for ever, you know? So long as we have the canal and it is working, the people will be getting these incomes.
Let's let these Oh! People have got their daily chores to do.
- Yes, and the streets are very narrow.
- Yes, indeed.
You call this a street.
It's interesting.
Yes, this is the way of getting to places, isn't it? - You see how a lot of things need to be changed.
- Yes.
But we don't have we don't have the money.
We need investment.
Our main objective is to escape from poverty and we are searching for that opportunity, and we think we find it.
The cost of the canal will be more than three times the size of the Nicaraguan economy.
It's a huge investment, but not everyone here thinks they'll see the benefits.
Where are you from, sir? From Britain.
- Eh? - Britain.
Where is that? - Well, England is part of Britain.
- OK.
I like Chelsea, you know? - Chelsea?! - Yeah.
That's what you know about England, is football.
The Premier League.
You understand? How is business for you here in Bluefields? - Yeah, well, not so good, you know? - What are we doing? The money is very hard.
Who's this? So, we were just asking, before you stopped to pick up another passenger, what is your view about the canal? - Do you think it's a good idea or a bad idea? - No, no, no.
Why? Why? So, you think the people who will work on the canal won't be they won't be Nicaraguan, they'll be foreigners? He has a point.
Few Nicaraguans work as civil engineers and the consortium behind the canal project is apparently planning to import up to 50,000 Chinese labourers to build it.
Bye-bye, madam.
Oh, great.
Small airport, no queue.
To continue my journey around the Caribbean coast, I flew north across Honduras to the island of Roatan.
35 miles from the Honduran mainland, Roatan is the country's most popular tourist destination.
So, we're on an island off the coast of Honduras in the Caribbean Sea.
Visitors flock here from Europe and North America for a taste of the Caribbean and the chance to get into the water.
This was home to the original "Pirates of the Caribbean".
By the mid-17th century, it's thought that were about 5,000 pirates based on the island.
You would not want to be sailing past them.
I was here to see a huge coral reef, the jewel of the Caribbean.
Dr.
Steve Box is a marine scientist working for the Smithsonian Institute.
Steve, what is so special about this place? The Mesoamerican Reef is the second largest barrier reef in the world, so it's very, very important.
And for the Caribbean, it's an incredible extension of reef systems spanning four countries.
- The second largest barrier reef on planet Earth is here.
- Yes, it is.
In the Caribbean.
And we're going to dive on it? We're going to dive on the southern extent of it.
The Mesoamerican Reef stretches 600 miles around the Caribbean Sea from Mexico to these Honduran islands.
As remarkable as Australia's Great Barrier Reef, it's like visiting another world.
It's home to more than 60 types of coral that provide habitat and food for more than 500 species of fish.
But in just the last few decades, half the reef's coral has been wiped out.
Like reefs across the tropics, pollution, overfishing and climate change are all killing this critical ecosystem.
It was upsetting to see mountains of dead coral.
However, some areas of reef here still have the highest concentrations of live coral found anywhere on the Mesoamerican Reef.
Steve has been investigating why and his research is focused on the likely saviour-- the parrotfish.
Parrotfish can grow to four foot long.
They're the largest herbivorous fish in the entire Caribbean.
Scientists have discovered that areas with healthy populations of parrotfish are better able to survive the problems affecting reefs elsewhere.
It is so still and the visibility is just incredible down there.
And we could see schools of little parrotfish.
I don't think I've ever seen that before.
It's a fundamental function on the reef for those parrotfish to be taking the algae out of the way.
So, they're like a team of cleaners.
Kind of like a flock of sheep moving around, taking the algae off the reef.
Keeping the grass short.
Keeping the grass short and allowing everything else to grow up around it.
Steve thinks the parrotfish is absolutely essential to the health of the coral reef.
He's trying to learn more about their behaviour to work out how best to protect them.
To do that, Steve's taking samples from parrotfish to track their movement around the Caribbean.
The best time to catch and study them is at night.
The parrotfish, when we see them during the day, they're up in and the reef, which actually makes them really hard to catch.
Whereas at night, they go and find a nice little crevice to fall asleep in.
And so we're going to go down with the torches, look for where we see them sleeping.
And once we find them, we will then move them into the net.
- In the dark.
Under the sea.
- In the dark.
I've never done a night dive.
- Is this going to be a tricky procedure? - It could be, yes.
- It's going to be exciting.
- Great! It'll be fun.
- It'll be fun.
It's an eerie experience to dive into blackness, but also completely magical.
Finding the sleeping parrotfish was surprisingly easy.
When he'd caught one in the net, Steve took clippings from parrotfish fins to collect their DNA.
The fins grow back and the fish are unharmed.
Steve's team are building a DNA database that's already uncovering the secret life of the parrotfish.
They're revealing that many of the parrotfish floated here as larvae on ocean currents from reefs hundreds of miles away.
So, Steve's research shows us that to save the Mesoamerican Reef, marine-protected areas need to span the region.
His work is helping to persuade Caribbean nations to set up national parks in the sea and ban fishing practices that harm parrotfish.
That was absolutely incredible.
Aagh! The colours are just so vibrant.
- A bag of water.
- Goldfish.
A bag of water with this tiny fin clip.
- That's all we need.
- That's it? It's amazing to be able to work out in the field like this and then take these tiny, tiny samples back and be able to do such amazing science.
Hopefully, what you're doing is going to make a really profound positive difference to life in our seas.
There are 100,000 people living on the island of Roatan.
This is a slightly different side of the island.
Many of them moved here to escape violence and crime on the mainland of Honduras.
I went to see someone who had fled here to work.
Buenos días.
So, this is Delores.
Delores has a tortilla stand.
Show me how to make tortillas.
Oh, OK.
IN TRANSLATION: You've got a couple there.
Look what's happening.
They're burning! Delores, those tortillas don't look healthy.
Let's make more.
I reckon I can get through a good half a dozen of these.
Delores, are you from the island, or are you from the mainland? So, how dangerous, how violent, was the neighbourhood you were living in? So, you came here because you were worried, you were terrified that the gangs were going to force your son to become a gang member.
And what would've happened if he'd refused? Delores and her son escaped from the mainland with little more than they could carry.
The gang took over their house.
As far as Delores knows, they're still there today.
- How are you doing? Gracias.
- Fine, thank you.
I was embarking on the most difficult and dangerous part of my journey around the Caribbean.
I took a ferry to the Honduran mainland.
The country is under attack by gangs and drug cartels, and it now has the highest murder rate on the planet.
This is probably the most violent country I've been to outside an actual warzone.
- Hello.
- How are you, mate? - Simon.
- Renato.
Hello, mate.
Ah.
Renato Lacayo had agreed to be my guide for the rest of my journey through Honduras.
A few bits and pieces here.
Flak jackets and everything.
Honduras has endured almost 300 conflicts, rebellions and changes of government.
It's the original banana republic.
Until the mid-20th century, foreign banana corporations dominated the country and helped to keep it poor.
Honduras has since suffered military rule, natural disasters and, now, violent crime.
It's actually much lighter outside than it appears from in here.
For safety reasons, for security reasons, the vehicle we're in has got heavily tinted windows and even windscreen as well.
It means people can't see there's foreigners in the vehicle.
Renato brought us the newspapers.
There's just page after page about crimes and murders.
This is very much everyday news.
It's normal for us because we're used to seeing the same headlines every day, just different faces.
Are you scared of what's happening here? Do you get frightened? You can't help but be afraid.
People you know have had a brother killed, they've had their father killed.
And it just seems like it's catching on, it's adding up, and at sometime, it'll catch up to you or your family, and that's a really frightening feeling.
It's not surprising Renato's worried.
Across Honduras, there's almost one murder every hour.
We headed to the city of San Pedro Sula.
It's the deadliest city on the planet.
We've arrived in San Pedro Sula.
This isn't a great time to be driving around, so we're going to find a hotel and then tomorrow, in daylight, we'll have a look around.
San Pedro Sula is Honduras's second city, home to just over a million people.
It looks pretty normal, but violent drug gangs are at war here.
We're going into one of the most dangerous neighbourhoods in one of the most dangerous cities in the world, so we need to wear body armour.
Almost 1 in 500 people are being murdered here each year.
The police force is corrupt and unable to stem the violence, so the military are being sent in to confront the gangs and reclaim no-go areas.
There's three military police officers patrolling just by the side of the road there.
They're clearly really trying to project their force into this city.
We were going on patrol with the military police as they went into a poor gang-controlled area of the city called Chamelecon.
I think it's astonishing that these are the lengths we have to go to be secure going into one of the neighbourhoods in this city.
(DOG BARKS) This is an extraordinary situation.
We've got, what, 20 heavily armed soldiers and officers around us.
There's a bloke with a balaclava who clearly doesn't want his face seen.
The country's two main gangs have fought to control this neighbourhood for years, using brutal tactics, including extortion, torture and murder.
Colonel, what does this mean? IN TRANSLATION: What sort of size a gang is MS-13? There are thought to be 300,000 gang members in Central America.
MS-13's the biggest gang.
It has close ties with Mexican drug cartels.
It's just completely bare now, except for a rather sad toilet there.
If you don't leave, we're going to kill you-- that's what they say.
And people get scared.
They'll just pick up their stuff, anything they can, and just leave.
We just want your home, what, to use to sell drugs or for somebody to live in, or either/or? And they also use them to commit crimes.
They call them crazy houses.
They come into people's homes, they push you out and then they use it to torture people.
Hundreds of homes have been abandoned in this area.
There are more than 110,000 gang members in Honduras.
They're tearing the country apart.
To combat the gangs, the military police mount regular patrols and set up checkpoints.
What are you looking for when you do a stop like this? IN TRANSLATION: Tattoos often indicate gang membership.
Under zero tolerance rules, if the police find a tattoo, these boys face arrest.
I think he's got a bullet wound on his chest, look at that.
Huge quantities of cocaine for use in North America are trafficked through Honduras.
So, it's almost inevitable that that's going to result in spectacular rates of violence here.
For me, Honduras and Hondurans are victims of America's demand for drugs.
The main cause of the war here is drugs.
Estimates vary, but up to £30 billion-worth of cocaine is believed to pass through Honduras on the way to the US each year.
How bad did things get? IN TRANSLATION: There are some signs the military are bringing a degree of security to this neighbourhood.
But they're far from winning the war.
(SIREN BLARES) A few hours later, we got a call saying there'd been an incident on the outskirts of the city.
We raced to the scene.
¡Prensa, prensa! Commissioner, can you tell us what's happened? IN TRANSLATION: Two police officers have been targeted? It's like a it's like an assassination.
51 police officers have been killed in this area? Yes, that's right.
That is unbelievable.
Are things getting better or worse here? It'll take a long time for things to get better.
This is The wounds are so deep.
You spoke to the workers from the morgue, I believe.
Did they say how many bodies they've collected today? They've collected eight bodies already-- seven homicides and one suicide.
- Seven murders in one day.
- In one day.
And it's still 9 o'clock at night, so we could have more.
These are the consequences of the drugs trade-- violence, corruption and a failing state.
There was only one way to meet the gangs tearing Honduras apart.
We're now going to what's said to be the headquarters for many of the gangs.
We're going into the city's prison.
It's said the most powerful gangs are now being run from inside these walls.
The prison's packed with more than 2,500 inmates, but it's not exactly a normal jail.
Buenas tardes.
The guards here just control the perimeter.
It's a dangerous place and I wasn't sure what would happen inside.
Flippin' heck! So, the gentleman in the white shirt there, he's the Bishop of San Pedro Sula.
We just had a quick chat and a meeting with him.
He is helping us Well, he is facilitating us being here.
He is effectively going to be our security, we think, in some parts of the prison.
Being with him will hopefully guarantee that we are safe.
Bishop Emiliani commands respect in areas of the prison where the guards don't usually go.
The bishops try to broker a truce between the government and the two most notorious street gangs in Honduras.
OK, we're about to enter the 18th Street area of the prison and the Monsignor is taking us inside.
The 18th Street gang has a brutal reputation.
As in the rest of the prison, the guards have given over control of this area to the prisoners themselves.
- Chief of the gangs? - Yes, yes.
(HE SPEAKS SPANISH) They want us to put the cameras down.
Cameras down.
After some negotiation, the gangsters allowed us inside their wing.
Families were visiting and there were no guards in sight.
It was astonishing.
Leaders of the 18th Street agreed to talk on condition we didn't show their faces.
IN TRANSLATION: The bishop says the 18th Street gang and its rivals, MS-13, agreed to the terms of a truce more than a year ago, but the Honduran government is refusing to discuss or negotiate.
Meanwhile, the violence continues.
The bishop took me to another wing to meet a reformed gang member.
We've got barbed wire, razor wire, around us.
There's a guard up above.
OK? IN TRANSLATION: Monsignor, how can we understand this? The gangs will take children as young as eight years old.
IN TRANSLATION: Honduras is a beautiful Caribbean country stuck between the drug producers of South America and the drug consumers to the north.
Its location means the government's fighting a losing battle against organised gangs and drug cartels.
Gracias, señores.
(THEY RESPOND IN SPANISH) The bishop took me away from the gang wings.
As we headed towards the guards at the gate, we entered the main area of the prison.
Here we have Here are the people working.
Wow.
This is incredible.
You can see there's shoe soles here being cut out.
There's some people up here working away.
I was still inside the jail.
The inmates are in control here.
Everybody is working, everybody's doing something.
They hand out the food, keep keys to the cells and decide who gets a decent bed or a punishment.
It felt like a combination of sweatshop and market, with cafes and shops.
This is astonishing.
- This is like a town.
- Yes.
Yes, like a town.
Yes.
Apparently, there is 80% employment inside the prison.
That's not only impressive in most countries, it's a hell of a lot higher than it is outside in the rest of Honduras.
Everyone was busy, but this isn't a safe zone.
One of the prisoners in charge here reportedly took control after beheading his predecessor and feeding his heart to a dog.
I have never seen anything like this.
We're inside a prison.
I have to keep telling myself that.
Despite the turmoil created by hundreds of murderers and criminals being thrown together in a tiny space, there's a bizarre sense of order inside the prison.
It only highlights the failure of the Honduran state outside.
Gracias, señor.
We all felt a huge sense of relief when we made it back safe and sound to the main gate.
(HE SIGHS) My God, that was That was a very intense and rather overwhelming experience.
It's very hard to really convey anything but a fraction of the incredible sights and sounds and senses that you experience in a situation like that.
The problems facing Honduras haven't developed overnight.
And until the river of cocaine flowing through here is stopped, it's hard to see an end to the violence.
I headed on to the last stop on my journey around the Caribbean Sea, the island of Jamaica.
It was somewhere I'd always wanted to go.
And I was hoping to learn a bit more about Jamaica than Rastas and reggae.
The Caribbean is a place of real extremes.
The crazy situation in Honduras and just extraordinary, raw, magnificent beauty here.
Morning! I'm meeting a bloke called Nick at this restaurant.
Oh, right, very funny, yes.
I was told I was meeting him in a blue boat.
Nick, hello.
Blue boat on the left.
I mean, how can you get that wrong? - Simon Reeve.
- Pleasure.
Pleasure.
Lovely to meet you.
How are you doing? Nick, what are you doing here? Your accent's not exactly local, is it? Originally from Derby.
My parents decided that they were going to move back here when I was about 16 or 17.
- I came back.
- So, they're from Jamaica? They're from here.
I've discovered the Jamaica they spoke about, the place which they talked about when I was growing up.
And that's been a surprise, a discovery? Revelation? You know what's been a real revelation to me? So, my parents were always like, you know, Jamaica, it's home, blah-blah-blah.
I get here and people are like, "Yo, you come from foreign.
" Sorry about my bad patois to all the people who can actually speak it.
But, you know, basically, "Do you come from abroad?" And it was like, "What, really?" Nick had suggested meeting here because locals are dealing with a problem that's affecting much of Jamaica and the entire Caribbean.
- What are they doing down there? Can we go and have a look? - Yeah.
They're building gabion baskets, just wire mesh and rocks.
That's what they hope will kind of keep back the water.
That's pretty makeshift, isn't it? 50 feet of this beach has disappeared underwater in just six years, and like communities across the entire region, people here are fighting to save their homes and businesses.
I mean, this sort of situation gets worse when you have storms.
And for many years, you know, especially my dad's generation, you know, they had a big storm in the '50s and they never had a big one until the '80s.
Now, you fast forward in recent years, there's been storm after storm after storm after storm.
And the beach just doesn't have time to regenerate or to basically just get back to normal.
You know, people are doing whatever they can, you know, to try and stop this happening.
Something is going wrong in the tropics.
The weather is changing.
And it's often not wealthy people who are suffering as a result, but poorer communities like this.
Our changing climate is already having a significant impact around the coast of Jamaica.
Scientists are warning that climate change will cause more storms and hurricanes around the region.
That's one of a number of problems plaguing this small nation.
It's a fabulous place to come for a holiday, but for locals, life here is still tough.
20% life in poverty and the country has one of the highest national debts in the world.
- Nick, where are we going? - So, we're heading to Source Farm.
Issues like high crime, unemployment and economic mismanagement have led many of the brightest and best Jamaicans to emigrate, mostly to the US.
It's called the brain drain and it's a huge problem across the Caribbean.
But Nick was taking me to meet a family who, like his, have returned to the island after living and working abroad.
Oh, right, here we are.
This is it.
Nicola Phillips sold her restaurant in Philadelphia and moved back home to set up Source Farm.
- This is Simon.
- Hello.
Simon Reeve.
Lovely to meet you.
- Welcome.
She came back with her brother, a qualified horticulturist, her mum, a trained nurse, and her sister, who's a teacher.
They brought their families and now there's a community of 25 people living here.
It sounds like you've all come back bringing skills into your family, but into the wider community as well.
We just want more people to be able to think that you can actually come back and make a difference.
How lucky are you, Mum, to have everybody here? I don't call it luck.
I think I'm blessed.
The debate in Western countries about immigration concentrates on the effect it has on us.
But emigration's a shocking cost to countries like Jamaica which has lost 85% of university educated workers.
However, the Phillips clan have come back to teach local farmers and help this heavily indebted country.
We have all these wonderful microclimates that we can grow almost anything.
We were built on agriculture in terms of, you know, historically, and we should be looking back to agriculture as a way to get ourselves out of debt.
That's an idyllic scene.
And sea behind.
It's a beautiful space to work.
One of the things that we do is that we don't put a crop in the ground unless we know where we have a market for it.
We are going to be very selective, cos it's a business.
But we also have the opportunity to bring in the tech stuff.
It's not just the same old thing that maybe grandpa did alone, but we need to integrate the technology that we have as well.
You've got, obviously, a passionate desire - to feed Jamaica and Jamaicans - Yes.
combined with spreadsheets to make sure all the numbers add up.
Yes, it always has to add up! Jamaica imports nearly a billion dollars' worth of food a year, and it needs to come up with ideas that encourage talented people to stay in the country.
So, Nicola's project couldn't be more important.
The next morning, Nick took me to the capital-- Kingston.
In recent decades, Jamaica's developed a reputation for violence, crime and corruption.
That's part of the reason so many locals have gone to live and work abroad.
But there's some good news-- the crime rate here is actually going down.
Just a few years ago, Jamaica was sliding into something of an abyss.
The murder rate here was rising uncontrollably to levels only seen in a country like Honduras.
But since then, it's started to turn a corner.
Jamaica's murder rate has fallen by 40% in recent years.
Cases of rape are down by a quarter.
A recent report stated Jamaica used to be one of the most corrupt countries in the entire Americas.
Now it's one of the least.
Jamaica has got a long way to go with reducing down levels of crime, and corruption as well.
It's actually doing better than many neighbouring countries.
Things are improving here.
- Inspector.
Simon Reeve.
- Hi, Simon.
- Very nice to meet you.
- Hello, sir.
- Ainsworth.
Simon Reeve.
Nice to meet you.
Inspector Ainsworth Shakes.
He's the chief polygrapher.
- The chief polygrapher? - Yes.
Goodness me.
You've looked into people's souls.
Oh, yeah, I like that.
(ALL LAUGH) Corrupt politicians, officials and policemen hold back so many countries that I visit.
Finally, it was a joy to see an agency and a government doing something about them.
This elite squad is tackling white-collar corruption and money laundering.
These are the unsung heroes who crunch the figure and follow the leads and the tracks and go through those complex investigations.
Our focus is on the major players, the kingpins, those persons who have amassed a lot of wealth, those persons who have reached controlled wealth and can fund their illicit lifestyle and other criminal activities.
Now the Jamaica authorities are going after hundreds of millions of pounds' worth of criminal assets.
The motto of this agency is, "no-one's above the law".
- Have a seat right there, please.
- Goodness.
The video here, CCTV.
Least of all, me.
We have here the cardio cuff.
It looks at changes in your heart rate as you are polygraphed.
Now I'm going to give you one of these cards.
- On the underside, there's a number.
Don't let me see it.
- OK.
Each time I ask you if you had picked a number, I want you to answer "No", - even when I ask you the number you have under your hand.
- I see.
Did you pick the number 16? No.
Did you pick the number 15? No.
Did you pick the number 7? No.
Did you pick the number 8? No.
And open your eyes.
This instrument is indicating that you have the number 8 under your hand.
So, now I know what it looks like when you're lying, right? (HE CHUCKLES) - All right.
- That's an ominous laugh, Inspector.
(HE CHUCKLES) Oh, yes.
What the polygraph does, if there's any deviation from the truth, any deviation, there will be a reaction to the question.
Who do you get in here? The bulk of our examinees have been police officers, because one of our major problems here in Jamaica has been corruption.
- And a number - Police corruption? - Police corruption, I can tell you.
There are persons who have come here and they've given us 99.
9% of the truth, which is still a lie.
So, our job is to get 100% of the truth out.
Why is tackling corruption so important? It's important because corruption has one, it has tarnished the image of the Jamaican Constabulary Force, it has tarnished the image of Jamaica.
It has depleted our economy.
It has driven investors away.
We realise that we have a job to do and we're going to do whatever it takes to tackle corruption, to tackle criminality.
And this is just one of the tools that we are going to use.
By polygraphing cops and officials, Jamaica's strengthening all of its key public institutions.
That means better policing and public services.
Jamaica's emerging as a rare success story in the battle against crime in the Caribbean.
The results are also being felt on the streets.
Nick took me into a tough Kingston neighbourhood called Southside.
Once upon a time, you'd talk about Southside, it was only known for gang culture.
Now people are coming in, people are coming into the community.
There are little restaurants opening.
And things like that, they wouldn't have happened before.
So, now, slowly but surely, this kind of community, it's reinventing itself, and that makes a huge difference to people who live here.
Nick had arranged for us to meet a man with first-hand experience of Southside before life began to improve.
Narado Bell was a feared gangster and enforcer.
Were you armed? Were you carrying a gun? - Mm-hm.
- Oh, yes, you're saying.
- Is that how it was? - Yeah.
That's how.
Kill or be killed.
What was the moment for you when you thought, "This has got to stop"? Narado took us to see a project that he believes helped turn both his fortunes and the fortunes of his community around.
To tackle crime, you have to tackle poverty, you have to give youngsters an alternative.
Jamaica's Citizen Security Justice Programme works with people from troubled areas, giving them an opportunity to learn a trade and get a job.
Yes, it's on-the-job skills training, and what's important about this aspect of it is that we are seeking to improve their employability skills as well as their technical skills.
Who are they and where have they come from? From some of our most volatile communities.
Where there's a lot of crime, a lot of violence.
Lots of crime, lots of violence.
- And a lot of unemployment.
- And high unemployment.
And we do have a motto here, that we say, if you come as a chicken, you leave as an eagle! - That's good.
You like that.
- Yes, I do! The project gives people skills and purpose.
It's a whole raft of measures and it's had astonishing results.
Violent crime in some areas where it's running has fallen by almost 70%.
Gangsters have been completely reformed.
- That's good work.
- Yeah, that's a beam.
That's a good weld.
- Using the concave motion.
- Using the concave motion.
I would be unfamiliar with that, but I can see it's a good weld.
Narado used to carry a gun.
Now he's a qualified welder and certified to instruct even the most hopeless student.
You're travelling too fast.
Slow that down.
Go, move, move with it.
OK.
That was really rubbish.
You're going to have to chip it all off and start again.
Could the old you have ever imagined - that the new you would be doing this? - No, never.
Never.
And what's really lovely to see is the pride you've got in your work as well.
And you're a really good teacher.
Get you! Jamaica's showing that it is possible to tackle even appalling rates of crime.
But to do that, you have to go after the big fish in parliament or the police force, as well as giving street criminals an alternative and a future.
I was coming to the end of my adventure.
What had surprised me most were the utter extremes of life I'd seen around the Caribbean from Barbados to Honduras, and from Haiti to Venezuela.
When we were first talking about making this journey around the Caribbean region, I never imagined for one moment I would find myself on the gang wing of a Honduran prison or hunting venomous fish or going up in the sky in a flying dinghy.
It's been incredible.
I ended my journey the same way I began.
On a beautiful Caribbean beach.
This is a region with serious problems with poverty and corruption, and there are enormous environmental challenges here.
But they're not insurmountable.
And this place is home to some of the warmest people on the planet.
And I'm finishing my journey in a time-honoured way.
For me, anyway.
Getting my boots wet.
It's the Caribbean! April 5th, 2015