Day 5: Out Here in the Field — Thinking Globally, Reporting Locally

By: James Fahn on December 13th, 2007

It would be easy at these ginormous summits to just stay inside the conference center and confine yourself to the maze of negotiating stances and policy briefs. But journalists are supposed to report on, and be in touch with, the real world. So our stay in Bali had to include a stint in the field.

Field trips play a vital role in any environmental journalism training session. It takes the reporters away from the talks in the classroom and let’s them practice their craft on the ground. It gives them material for actual stories that will be published or broadcast directly from the workshop (and on the workshop’s topics). It gives them experience in interviewing a variety of sources: from villagers to scientists to government officials. Once in the field, journalists find they are taken in many different and unexpected directions – as is often the case when reporting on their own — which generates many lessons that might not otherwise have been learned.

And let’s face it: field trips are just more fun than staying in the classroom. But they’re not junkets. In fact, they can be rough going, even in an idyllic place such as Bali.

During our field trip last Thursday, for instance, it was blazing hot, and the island we went to – Serengan — is hardly a Garden of Eden. In fact, it’s not even an island any more. Land reclamation has created a land bridge to Bali itself, and enlarged the size of the Serengan four times over, according to Wayan Patut, a community activist who has long fought against the project.

The reason for all the opposition is that the reclamation has destroyed much of the coastal habitat, and thus the livelihoods of many local people. Also, 24 families lost their homes. So why was it carried out in the first place? A company affiliated with the local military and the sons of former President Suharto had the necessary connections, and the necessary might. They wanted to turn the area into a resort. But the project was suspended in 1997 and has instead become something of a wasteland.

During the trip, we also learned about a fascinating new industry: coral harvesting (as opposed to coral mining). We visited a factory that is exporting ornamental coral to foreign aquarium shops, and with the help of Telepak, an Indonesian NGO, are trying to make it sustainable by also planting coral. This is a process Wayan helped to establish, and he has the local community helping with the planting – in some cases, kids now plant coral where their parents harvest(ed) them.

According to Ketut Sudiarta, an academic from Warmadewa University, the planting process works pretty well. Coral “seedlings” are grown in nurseries. After being planted in reefs, they reportedly mature quickly and can be harvested after one or two years. The coral can then be exported with a CITES letter and a forestry permit, but there is as yet no certification process to ensure the system is sustainable, as there is for aquarium fish.

One problem, Ketut says, comes in finding parent coral to serve as donors for seedlings. Theoretically, there is a plan to set aside 40% of reefs for natural coral, 30% for parent coral, and 30% for plantations, but there is still plenty of illicit mining. Surprisingly, coral plantations sound more diverse than those in forestry, as according to Ketut, there can be as many as 30 species planted, rather than the monocultures usually found in tree plantations.

All very interesting, but what does it what have to do with climate change? Well, Ketut claimed coral is a powerful carbon sink. Other sources describe it as a modest one, but important nonetheless. After the success communities have seen with their re-planting, however, Ketut says “they are facing defeat by global warming”, which could affect coral by changing sea temperatures (coral bleaching occurs when the water gets too warm), currents, winds and precipitation patterns.

Reclamation, meanwhile, could be an adaptation strategy adopted by coastal cities eager to stem off the effects of rising sea levels. But Wayan says Serengan’s experience shows it is not an advisable one.

To be honest, such links to climate change are real, but are also probably secondary. The issues we explored on our field trip are more local and global, and that is a problem we as journalists face all the time. Most people are primarily interested in local news and want clear explanations of cause and effect. Reporters focusing on climate change find it hard to satisfy them while also remaining true to science. It’s a major dilemma, and something we at the Earth Journalism Network have to work on.

The challenge was underlined by the final stop of our field trip, at a fishing port in Jimbaran. The fishermen said they noticed changes in the weather in recent years, and that they found themselves going farther and farther to catch fish. But they didn’t know why, and of course neither do we. It’s possible climate change is affecting fish yields and migration patterns. It’s also possible (likely, even) that there is a lot of overfishing going on. Unless we have access to an in-depth study, how do we differentiate the impacts of these dynamics?

We need to think globally, and report locally. But it’s not going to be easy.