The Durban FilmMart Institute (DFM) is proud to announce that the industry programme for its 2026 edition, taking place from 9 to 12 October in Durban, is now live. This year’s line-up brings together sessions on equitable co-production, film financing, advocacy and lobbying, artificial intelligence and emerging formats such as vertical drama, alongside DFM’s already announced dedicated Impact and Animation Day strands and its wider partner-programmed offering.
“This programme reflects where the African film industry is right now: expanding audiences, growing co-production pathways and new capital arriving in new forms, but also real questions about advocacy, technology and who gets to shape the future of the sector,” says Magdalene Reddy, Director of the Durban FilmMart Institute. “We’ve built this year’s sessions to meet those questions head-on, and we’re proud to open the programme to delegates and partners as we count down to October.”
Talking Cents:Where’s The Change: Co-production Beyond Financial Collaboration: With the expansion and renewal of international co-production pathways, questions about the practical limits treaties place on collaboration in filmmaking have become more urgent. This session brings together filmmakers and organisations to reflect on collaborative methods grounded in Ubuntu, collective responsibility and interconnectedness, while interrogating the future of collaboration. The panel includes Mathew Cerf of Agbajowo Collective, one of several directors of the successful Nigerian film The Vagabond Queen of Lagos, Tatiana Carvalho Costa, head of the APAN filmmakers and professionals in the Brazilian audiovisual sector, committed to strengthening public policies and stimulating positive market initiatives that promote and expand black audiovisual in Brazil, Ian Mark Kimanje of Film Garage Studios & North Inc, a Ugandan/Canadian writer, director and producer who has worked in Africa, Australia, Europe and North America. Renowned filmmaker, cultural operator and executive director of Documentary Africa (DocA) Mohamed Saïd Ouma and award winning filmmaker and educator, Sylvia Vollenhoven who has produced projects such as Jozi Gold (2019), Project Spear (2012) and Emo Adams: Tall, Dark and Afrikaans (2015). The session will be moderated by Marion Schmidt .
Talking Cents | More Than Making Cents: A New View On Financing Film: Financing has always been a creative endeavour, but today’s global economic conditions require filmmakers to innovate resilient frameworks that can sustain the production pipeline and grow Global South industries. This session explores non-traditional financing approaches, including cooperative ecologies that lead to greater creative control, narrative sovereignty and the retention of intellectual property. The session will brings together Nathan Adabadze of Media Finance Capital where he leads the investment team and manages a diverse, multi-million-pound portfolio of film and television investments. Vancouver-based independent film producer Alex Bogomolov, who works in investor-backed indie features. Khosie Dali award-winning South African film producer and founder of Miss K Productions. Her debut feature Sons of the Sea won Best South African Film at DIFF. A Film Independent Fellow and alumna of EAVE, Rotterdam, and Realness, and leads Qhakaza Workshop for emerging producers., Samantha Kaine Founder and Executive Director, Independent Media Producers Association of Creative Talent (IMPACT, as well as, award-winning independent film and television creative producer, advocate and mentor, Sam Soko, award-winning director, producer, and editor based in Nairobi, Kenya. He is co-founder of LBx Africa, a Kenyan production company that works to bring uniquely African perspectives to global audiences. He is serves as a recurring judge for The Whickers Film & TV Funding Awards. This discuss will be moderated by Nataleah Hunter-Young
Who Is Fighting Our Corner? Film Advocacy and Lobbying on the African Continent: African film industries are growing, but growth without protection is fragile. This panel brings together representatives doing active advocacy and lobbying work across the continent ,from guilds and professional associations to filmmaker collectives and civil society bodies , to examine what advocacy looks like in practice, where it has succeeded and failed, and how audiences fit into the advocacy picture. Panellist for this session include: Hicham Falah Hicham Falah is a Moroccan DOP, director, producer, programmer and expert. Since 2012, he runs the Agadir International Documentary Film Festival (FIDADOC), as well as its training and industry programs dedicated to emerging African filmmakers, the Documentary Beehive. His production company CINEMA SALAMA, was founded in 2018 to support and promote Moroccan documentarians, Serge Kouami Noukoue is co-founder and Executive Director of the Nollywood Week (NOW!) Film Festival and Okada Media, is work focuses on changing perceptions of African cinema, promoting African soft power, and fostering industry mentorship across the continent. Marie Lora-Mungai an investor, strategic advisor, and entrepreneur specialized in the African Creative Industries and Sports Business, her advisory firm Restless Global, has worked with international companies, institutions and investors such as IFC, Proparco, Afreximbank, UNESCO, Netflix, Warner Bros., Twitter, and Trace, and with the governments of France and Nigeria and Susan Mbogo Executive Director of Docubox, East African Documentary Film Fund- Docubox, which has created a significant impact in the film industry in the East African region through the support of over 150 films through grants & capacity-building initiatives. Lara Utian-Preston of LADIMA, will be the moderator of the session
From the DFM to the Croisette: Samantha Biffot on Producing “Ben’Imana”: Producer Samantha Biffot joins us to trace the years-long journey of Ben’Imana ,Marie Clémentine Dusabejambo’s Rwandan-Gabonese drama ,from its early development as a work-in-progress project at the DFM to its celebrated premiere in Un Certain Regard at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, where it went on to win the FIPRESCI Prize and the Caméra d’Or. Biffot will discuss the realities of financing and packaging an international co-production across Rwanda, Gabon, France, Norway, and Ivory Coast, and what it takes to carry a story about memory and survival after genocide from a market pitch to the world stage.
AI and Animation: Artificial intelligence continues to be a hot-button topic across the film landscape, and animation filmmaking may be the most affected, given how integral the intersection of art and technology already is to the creative process. This session interrogates what AI means for the world of animation filmmaking, the opportunities, the risks, and the long-term effect on a developing sector such as African animation. Featuring Julia Bruton of Sinnema Animation Studio GbR & VR Women, a Berlin-based animation agency specialising in 2D and 3D animation, motion design, and character design; Alexis Hoffmann of Special Touch Studio, a production company focused on Africa, the Caribbean, Asia, the Middle East; and Hamid Ibrahim s a three-time Emmy-nominated creative executive, award-winning production designer, and visionary entrepreneur shaping the future of African storytelling. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Kugali Media, a pioneering visual entertainment company redefining African narratives through animation, comics, and immersive media.
Short Form, Big Impact: The Rise of Vertical Dramas Vertical dramas have exploded onto the international scene, reshaping how stories are consumed on mobile-first platforms and unlocking new revenue models for creators. This session examines the format’s rapid global rise and its emerging footprint on the African continent, and whether it could become a viable new pathway for content and commerce. Leading the conversation will be panellists, Minnie Harris Head of MTN Group Digital Service Verticals and Markets, Hlomla Dandala, Managin Director of Digicine Zukisani Mabece, , Flavia Motsisi of Both Worlds Media, Development Executive and Creative Producer, bringing with her over a decade of experience shaping award-winning African television and film. An International Emmy nominee and a Forbes Africa honoree for her contribution to scripted content. Nataleah Hunter-Young will moderate the session
These sessions feature as just a small part of the Durban FilmMart’s extensive four-day industry programme, This year’s Durban FilmMart Industry Programme is built around a single conviction: that the African film industry’s future depends on the strength and honesty of its relationships — with capital, with audiences, with partners abroad, and with itself. The CoProduction Focus stream interrogates what genuine partnership looks like in practice, from sessions like Fruits of Labour: Service as a Form of Coproduction, which asks whether South African service companies deserve recognition as true collaborators, to South Africa as Coproducing Partner, which confronts the administrative turbulence currently testing the country’s long-standing treaty network, through to Brazil-Africa: Building Bridges Through Coproduction, which looks outward to new South-South alliances. That same spirit of scrutiny runs through The Power of Programming stream, where sessions on industry programming itself and the pressures facing the international festival circuit ask what infrastructure the sector still lacks and who is being left out of it, while two closed-door think tanks on distribution and audience design push past diagnosis into practical strategy for reaching African audiences on their own terms. Sector-specific strands deepen the picture: CTIAF’s Animation Day, anchored by Dianne Makings’ insistence that talent was never the question, tackles the business of building a sustainable animation industry; Doc Society and its partners’ Doc Day: Impact Edition reframes impact producing as a discipline as rigorous as directing or financing; and NEWF’s Beyond the Wild sessions push natural world storytelling toward questions of spirituality, authorship and ownership. Threaded through all of it is a set of international partnerships — most visibly the Canadian delegation and the Cross Continental Forum’s 25th-anniversary panel — that embody DFM’s core claim, voiced by DFMI head Magdalene Reddy, that Durban FilmMart exists to be the meeting space where shared interest across continents becomes something built together.
To find more information on the sessions above, the rest of the Durban FilmMart Industry Programme and so much more, go to https://durbanfilmmart.co.za/