MUMBAI: The Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), MTV International and MTV Europe are launching two initiatives addressing HIV/Aids and the trafficking in persons.

The projects include the first-ever made for TV movie for MTV's Staying Alive HIV/Aids awareness campaign. It will premiere on MTV internationally on 1 December 2005.

The two hour TV movie Transit will use fiction to deliver HIV/Aids prevention messages to young people. Co-written by Murilo Pasta and Niall MacCormick, the film explores themes of emotion and sexuality in a candid manner to engage young people and encourage them to practice safer sex.

The other television initiative is more Europe specific. It is the first campaign of the MTV Europe Foundation and is called End eXploitatIon and Trafficking (Exit). The aim is to combat the trafficking in persons - specifically women - for sexual exploitation in Europe.

The above mentioned projects will be offered free to all TV broadcasters worldwide to get the messages of the campaigns out to the widest audiences possible.

As far as Transit is concerned MTV and Sida will work together to develop teaching materials related to the film. This will be available in schools and to any community-based organisations interested in adapting the materials for local use.

Launched in 1998, MTV's Staying Alive campaign seeks to help prevent HIV/Aids by empowering youth to protect themselves, fight stigma and discrimination, and engage businesses, media and organisations to form their own response to HIV/AIDS.

The campaign includes documentaries, concert events, discussion programmes and made for TV movies, public service announcements, sexual behaviour polls, a dedicated, multi-lingual Web site www.staying-alive.org, and off-air marketing and grassroots promotions. Last year's campaign reached 74 per cent of the world's TV households - or 938 million households.