German film fund MFG Medien und Filmgesellschaft Baden-Wuerttemberg has joined the list of backers of the new South Africa-based producers' training initiative "AVEA - Audiovisual Entrepreneurs of Africa" which is modelled on the MEDIA programme's EAVE scheme.

Financing for the initiative, which aims to prepare film and TV producers from the southern half of the African continent for the national and international film markets, has come largely from UNESCO, the British Council, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs as well as MFG.

AVEA's director Gina Bonmariage worked in the past for the EAVE training programme and has used her contacts from those training sessions to win French producer Jacques Bidou, Rotterdam Film Festival's Sandra den Hamer, NFTS' Clare Downs and Berlin-based producer Luciano Gloor as members of her committee of experts.