MTV Shuga: Down South

The objective of the MTV Shuga television series, described at Related Summaries, below, is to bring HIV into the minds of the viewers, and to encourage them to reflect on their own behaviour. It also seeks to encourage peer-to-peer conversations, and youth-to-parent conversations. The campaign seeks to achieve this by providing an entertaining, gripping storyline into which are interwoven themes related to HIV (testing, treatment, living with HIV, condom use, etc.), gender-based violence, maternal health, contraception, and a wide array of other sexual and reproductive health issues affecting young people.

In order to ensure that the show's scripts reflect the real-life experience of the intended audience, MTV Shuga held focus group discussions (FGDs) to establish the issues that young people face. By conducting research into the opinions and experiences of the chosen demographic, the team seeks to produce hard-hitting, real-life content that resonates deeply with young audiences, and allows them to identify with at least one of the many storylines that develop throughout the show. In addition, draft scripts for upcoming campaigns are shared with the focus groups and discussed. The feedback from those focus group discussions is used to refine the scripts that eventually become the final versions.

In order to attract young audiences and reflect their experiences, DS1 is set in the cool clubs, hangouts, and schools of Johannesburg’s suburb of Braamfontein, and the township of "Zenzele". The show features popular musicians and has included some of the Nigerian characters of the previous series to maintain a pan-African feel and relevance. The show is being broadcast across Africa and is available rights-free at no cost to third-party broadcasters. Click here to view episodes in this series.

The television series is complemented by the following activities:

• A 15-part radio series that runs alongside the TV series.
• Peer education: an on-the-ground peer education programme designed to enable young people to get the help they need, driving them towards mobile testing and existing health services.
• Branding, which seeks to ensure that the MTV Shuga brand is everywhere that young people go to access vital sexual and reproductive health information.
• A comic book, a mobile information service, social media, and a range of digital platforms, including the MTV Shuga website, which offers resources for young people seeking information around sexuality and HIV/AIDS, as well as access to all episodes in the series and behind-the-scenes news and information.

To support the theme of teenage pregnancy dealt with in the drama, MTV Staying Alive Foundation and MTV Base produced a special one-off episode of the documentary series "16 and Pregnant", focusing on the experiences of three South African teens. This hour-long documentary follows their lives and offers a look into the wide variety of challenges faced by pregnant teens in South Africa, including marriage, adoption, religion, finances, stigma, family pressures, education, and employment prospects, as well as the dual challenges of being pregnant and HIV+ at the same time.

In 2019-2020, DS2 was produced in South Africa and incorporated storylines designed to increase awareness and demand for HIV testing, including self-testing and PrEP, in ways that resonate with young people. As with all previous series, the producers conducted initial formative work to develop and validate storylines and scripts with young people through FGDs. The show was complemented by wrap-around, "360-media" activities, including a radio series, documentary films, and online resources. In the town of Mthatha in Eastern Cape, South Africa, peer education and community events and a graphic novel distributed through schools enabled opportunities for offline engagement among those underserved by television and the internet.

HIV/AIDS, Gender-Based Violence, Reproductive Health, Youth

To continuously improve its engagement of young people, MTV Shuga regularly asks its audience about the storyline and messaging while airing each episode. The audience can text answers using a Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) platform or through the MTV Shuga website. For DS1, MTV Shuga received more than 252,000 answers to 25 questions about messaging and storyline from 43,823 users. DS1's reach spanned 96% of countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The content through its past campaign is freely available to third-party broadcasters and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and on the website in perpetuity.

For an evaluation of DS2, see Related Summaries, below.