Day 4: From silos to networks

By: James Fahn on December 8th, 2007

It should be possible to “leap the media gap”. After all, there generally is good climate expertise in most developing countries, even if it is concentrated in a few universities, institutes and government agencies. The problem is, this knowledge doesn’t go out, it goes up.

Government officials pass on their analysis to their superiors. Scientists send their research findings to academic publications, or in some cases to international agencies like the IPCC. When there is the occasional press conference, or even a information campaign, these experts are often woeful at communicating complex ideas to journalists, who in turn often fail to understand the technical complexities.

So the information goes up to people who already understand the implications. If it comes back down to the public, it’s usually in the form of local media carrying the reports of wire agencies or international broadcasters reporting on, say, the latest IPCC report. Local journalists covering the environment often lack the training or the time to do a proper job of it, since they’re often asked to produce lots of stories on topics ranging from science to agriculture to health.

And yet, these local journalists are ideally placed to pass on climate information and analysis to the public, to translate the technical jargon into terms their audience can understand – if only they could gain the necessary experience, training and resources. That’s where Internews and EJN comes in.

The Earth Journalism Network held a meeting on Wednesday with about 30 of our country partners and other fellows to discuss what we could do to improve climate change coverage in our home countries after Bali.

Current EJN partners Harry Surjadi (Indonesia), Tran Thi Thuy Binh (Vietnam), Miguel Angel de Alba (Mexico), Myint Zaw (Myanmar), Kamol Sukin (Thailand) and our 5 fellows from China all presented on their current efforts. There was general agreement about what a struggle it is to get editors to accept climate change stories see Li Hujun’s blog and to produce stories that are both scientifically accurate and easy to understand. Translating such a global story into a local one is extremely challenging.

In addition to the research by Internews on climate change coverage in Vietnam and by Panos in South Africa and the Caribbean, it was also revealed that the British Council had some research results on media coverage in the Chinese press from 2005. The sampling was pretty small, but it certainly seems as if climate change gets more coverage in China than Vietnam, even though Vietnam is probably more vulnerable to devastating impacts.

So what can be done? The group brainstormed up a bunch of ideas. Some, like training or developing a handbook translated into different languages, weren’t new, but were emphasized as crucial. These and other recommendations – such as a training of trainers course and journalism exchanges between countries— echoed those made last August at the EJN Regional Conference in Chiang Mai, where the idea to make the handbook an online, open source document was put forth.

In Bali, Aman Sethi from India has also suggested something I’ve long wanted to do: training in computer-assisted reporting. There’s just so much environmental and financial data online now that can be mined to dig up with great stories. Other ideas from the convening included an E-newsroom for mentoring and support, mapping out problems and success stories online, partnerships with major global media networks, fellowships to produce specific stories, and establishing dialogues not just with scientists and experts (long discussed) but with green entrepreneurs, as well.

Overcoming antiquated editors may be the biggest challenge. There was widespread interest in another idea that arose in Chiang Mai: prizes for editors, or rather for newsgroups (as opposed to individual journalists) with the best environmental coverage. Harry also suggested inviting editors to an “Advanced” briefing (even though many editors aren’t) that will let them “Meet The Experts”.

Perhaps the most intriguing idea came from Eneya Maseko of the Panos Institute in South Africa: create an Editor’s Network just as we have Environmental Journalist networks. What might this entail? How about identifying the most progressive editors in a region (or a country), gatekeepers who have demonstrated their commitment to environmental coverage, and bringing them together to identify the obstacles they face and ways to overcome them. With the right push, they could even become advocates amongst their peers. I think it’s worth a try…