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What the 2026 selection means
Impact Lab is the professional development strand of FIFDH Impact Days, which combines online activity with public and industry events in Geneva. The selected teams work for several months on an impact strategy: defining campaign goals, identifying audiences and stakeholders, preparing an impact pitch and finding partners beyond the documentary sector.
FIFDH says the programme connects filmmakers with NGOs, international organisations, foundations, philanthropists and impact producers when teams meet in Geneva in March. In the organisation’s words, “Every year we select compelling documentary projects from around the world and, over several months, train the filmmaking teams to craft an impact strategy.”
FIFDH received almost 200 submissions from 70 countries, with all five continents represented. The organisation says projects were assessed for cinematographic quality; the urgency and importance of their human-rights or environmental subject; their potential to influence public or stakeholder opinion and the clarity of their impact vision; and their relevance to Geneva’s network of international organisations, NGOs and diplomatic missions.
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The 12 projects and the issues they address
| Project | Filmmaker(s) | Subject described by FIFDH |
|---|---|---|
| Gaza Sunbirds | Flavia Cappellini (Italy) | A young amputee cyclist and his team pursue international representation for Palestine while bombs fall on Gaza. FIFDH describes the effort as a six-year mission. |
| Green Gold | Selim Benzeghia (France) and Ivonne Serna (Mexico) | Land defenders and local producers in Mexico’s avocado-growing region confront cartel violence, deforestation and tensions intensified by global demand. |
| Green Is the Fire’s Tint | Arya Rothe (India), Isabella Rinaldi (Italy) and Cristina Hanes (Romania) | Somi, a former Maoist rebel, becomes the focus of a call for collective action to protect land, quality of life and Indigenous cultural heritage in central India. |
| Olimbi – Mother Courage | Karlo Mlinar (Croatia) | After learning in 2003 that she and her children were HIV positive, Olimbi Hoxhaj faced stigma and institutional neglect before becoming a leading advocate for people living with HIV in Albania. |
| Confidential Project | An Afghan filmmaking collective | A character-driven documentary about underground scenes of women’s historic resistance in occupied Kabul. |
| The Blue Sweater With a Yellow Hole | Tetiana Khodakivska (Ukraine) | Ukrainian children who escaped Russian re-education camps process traumatic memories through drawings that are transformed into animation. |
| The Quiet Part | Rachel Lauren Mueller (United States) | A pagan white-supremacist group takes root in a small American farming town, prompting a struggle over belonging and the normalisation of extremism. |
| This Is Not a Civil War | Oliver Petrie (France) | Hnin, a Burmese activist who fled to Thailand after the 2021 coup, returns clandestinely to Myanmar and meets young people rebuilding democratic society through non-violent work in education, healing and information. |
| UFO | Anonymous | FIFDH identifies the project as confidential and says no further public information is currently available. |
| War on Women | Maris Salumets (Estonia) | After discovering her mother’s allegiance to a far-right movement, the director investigates an international network that FIFDH says attacks democracy and gender rights using the language of “traditional family values.” |
| Water Is Coming | Lansana Mansaray (Sierra Leone) | FIFDH lists the project as confidential and provides no public synopsis. |
| Women and War | Elwira Niewiera (Poland) | Three Ukrainian women who survived captivity and war-related violence undergo therapy for war trauma while working to reclaim their lives. |
The announcement gives a short synopsis for Confidential Project. It is separate from UFO and Water Is Coming, for which FIFDH says information cannot currently be disclosed.
How Impact Lab is structured
The programme-level Impact Lab description covers late-production non-fiction films. Eligible films are at least 52 minutes long and, by the December preceding the next festival edition, should be in late production, editing or post-production with at least 75% of the material shot. A teaser or trailer is required. These are general programme rules, not additional facts about the production status of each selected project.
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The training consists of 10 modules requiring at least 15 hours of online attendance from October through February, plus approximately 20 hours of team homework and preparation. The programme culminates in March in Geneva, where selected teams receive coaching, pitching practice, networking opportunities and curated meetings with potential institutional and philanthropic partners.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why the cohort matters
Taken together, the projects show how documentary impact can operate across different scales. Several focus on people confronting state violence or war, including children subjected to re-education, women surviving captivity, Afghan resistance networks and civilians rebuilding Myanmar’s democratic life. Others examine structural threats: cartel-driven deforestation, attacks on gender rights, HIV stigma and the spread of political extremism.
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The environmental films connect local land struggles to international systems. Green Gold links avocado demand to violence and forest loss, while Green Is the Fire’s Tint places Indigenous land and cultural protection at the centre of its story. The selection also includes stories of representation and resilience, from amputee athletes in Gaza to women reclaiming agency after war.
Impact Lab does not announce distribution deals or consumer availability for these films. Its stated purpose is to help teams turn a documentary’s subject into a practical campaign, build relationships with organisations that can act on the issue and reach audiences capable of influencing policy, institutions or public debate.
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What is publicly known—and what is not
- The 2026 cohort contains 12 projects selected from almost 200 submissions representing 70 countries.
- FIFDH has published brief descriptions, while fuller project details are not publicly available for most projects.
- UFO and Water Is Coming have no public synopsis in the announcement.
- The announcement does not establish release dates, distributors, streaming availability, budgets or campaign outcomes.
- Programme eligibility and workload details come from FIFDH’s general Impact Lab guidance and may change for later editions.
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