Global IssuesEnvironmental JournalismThe planet’s environmental future will be decided in the developing world. Home to four-fifths of the world’s population, the world’s fastest growing economies, and the richest remaining pockets of biodiversity, these countries will ultimately determine how drastically our climate changes, how many species go extinct, and to what extent our food chain becomes contaminated. The local media play a critical role in influencing how governments and societies balance growth with sustainability. Unfortunately, environmental news is given short shrift almost everywhere, particularly in the developing world, where reporters are often assigned to cover this field without any training in environmental or scientific issues. They also face tremendous pressures from powerful local interests, the advertisers who support their companies, and even their own editors. The Earth Journalism Network (EJN), a project of Internews, seeks to empower and enable journalists to cover the environment more effectively. By working with journalists the world over, EJN aims to improve access to quality environmental news and information and engage more voices in environmental policy dialogue on an international scale. Earth Journalism NetworkInternews launched the Earth Journalism Network in 2004 to help journalists in developing countries cover the environment more effectively. Since relocating its headquarters from the U.S. to Thailand, EJN has been particularly active in Asia. EJN is currently working with environmental journalists from Indonesia, China, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Burma and Laos. IndonesiaEJN celebrated Earth Day, 2006 by sponsoring the launch of the Society of Indonesian Environmental Journalists at a conference at Tangkahan, on the edge of Gunung Leuser National Park in Sumatra. The event culminated with the signing of the Tangkahan Declaration, formally creating the Masyarakat Jurnalis Lingkungan Indonesia ("Society of Indonesian Environmental Journalists") and establishing its guiding principles. Participating members also elected an executive director: Harry Surjadi, a veteran environmental journalist who previously worked at the newspaper Kompas. Subsequently, in February, 2007, EJN supported an SIEJ workshop on marine and coastal resources that took place in northern Sulawesi, near the Bunaken Marine National Park. See also: Society of Indonesian Environmental Journalists Launched on Earth Day (PDF), May 2006 ThailandEJN’s base in Thailand has enabled Internews to co-sponsor some landmark workshops introducing regional journalists to environmental issues. The first, organized by Internews, took 13 journalists working in Thailand up to the highlands for six days where they learned about the complex interplay between farmers, forests, loggers and government, and the various approaches that would allow a balance between development and environmental concerns. The second workshop, organized by two partner organizations, the Salween News Network and the Thai Society of Environmental Journalists, brought together Thai and regional journalists for two days to discuss key environmental issues such as dams, pipelines and forestry. In July, 2006, EJN also teamed up with Internews’ Thai Media Support program to carry out a two-day seminar on environmental issues for 20 journalism students at Chiang Mai University. ChinaEJN Executive Director James Fahn traveled to Beijing in May 2006 to deliver a lecture to the "salon" of environmental journalists which has been active in raising key issues in the press. He also contributed an article that was published in the China Daily and met with other potential partners. In September 2006, EJN provided resource materials and people, including keynote speaker Gary Strieker, to a workshop on environmental reporting held in Beijing by the Capital Youth Journalists’ Association. Strieker, EJN's lead TV trainer and CNN International’s former chief environmental correspondent also spoke on corporate social responsibility at the China Europe International Business School in Shanghai in May 2007. EJN also joined with Internews China to produce a media conference on environmental law that focused on four important legal cases involving logging, water pollution, air pollution and urban development. Over the coming year, EJN plans to organize more workshops on pollution, climate change and environmental health in both Beijing and the South. Earth Journalism Network Goes Behind China’s Headlines Vietnam, Cambodia and LaosEJN has launched a two-year project to build the capacity of environmental journalists in the lower Mekong region. In collaboration with the Vietnam Forum of Environmental Journalists, EJN has carried out three journalism training workshops that focused on biodiversity and related subjects, including conservation policies and sustainable livelihoods. Stories produced from a field trip to Tam Dao National Park in northern Vietnam resulted in the downsizing and review of an "eco-tourism" project slated for the area. The other two workshops – in central and southern Vietnam – were held in Bach Ma and Nui Chan national parks, respectively. In Cambodia, EJN teamed up with the Royal University of Phnom Penh to produce a similar workshop that brought a group of journalists to Kirirom National Park and instructed them in specialized techniques to cover the environment. In February 2007, EJN supported a media workshop in Laos that focused on good governance and its relationship to the environment. Over the coming year, fellowships will be awarded to journalists participating in the Vietnam and Cambodia workshops. EJN-supported academics are carrying out baseline studies on the current level of environmental journalism in Vietnam and Cambodia. A regional conference in August 2007 will bring together journalists from Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and other countries for discussions on how they can cooperate and improve the quantity and quality of environmental coverage in the region. Regional Asia and the Mekong DeltaIn October 2005, EJN brought together five of the leading environmental journalists from around the region for an intense and frank discussion on how to improve the field. Representing journalism networks from China, India, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, the group identified numerous obstacles to overcome and several strategies to be pursued, including capacitybuilding through workshops and the training of trainers, regional and local fellowships that would support coverage of key stories, and coproduction work that would appear in local media and also on the web. Ultimately, the participants agreed to work together to advance environmental journalism in Asia, beginning with plans to collaborate in the coverage of some key trans-boundary issues. In May and June of 2006, EJN helped to sponsor a month-long journalism workshop organized by the Indochina Media Memorial foundation that focused on environmental issues surrounding the Mekong River. The course brought together journalists from Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, and Burma and is particularly noteworthy for the inclusion of three journalists selected from China, which has built a series of dams on its portion of the river that is now having serious impacts downstream. EJN supported the presence of the Chinese journalists, and Fahn served as a resource person for the course. MexicoIn Mexico, EJN has worked with a couple of national journalism networks to advance environmental coverage. It is supporting the consolidation of the Mexican Network of Environmental Journalists (REMPA) into an active organization through a conference that will take place in Xalapa in May, 2007. Previously in Xalapa, EJN joined up with a national women’s radio network named CIDEM on a four-day workshop in Xalapa that brought together 10 women journalists to study radio production, community-based forestry and gender issues. The participants visited a highland forest community seeking to follow a sustainable approach to natural resource use, and produced a series of radio stories. Sponsors and PartnersThe activities of the Earth Journalism Network have been funded by EJN has a strategic partnership with the non-profit television production company Environment News Trust, headed by veteran environmental journalist Gary Strieker. LinksAlliance of Independent Journalists - Indonesia Assignment Earth Video Brazilian Network of Environmental Journalists Center for Environmental Journalism Colectivo de Investigación Desarrollo y Educación entre Mujeres (CIDEM) Ethiopian Environmental Journalists Association (EEJA) - Contact Argaw Ashine, Chairman, P.O. Box 17684, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia International Federation of Environmental Journalists Knight Center for Environmental Journalism A Land on Fire, the Environmental Consequences of the Southeast Asian Boom, by EJN Executive Director James Fahn Periodistas Ambientales (a Mexican network of environmental journalists) Society of Environmental Journalists Thai Society of Environmental Journalists Vietnam Forum of Environmental Journalists
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"The story of our environment may well be the most important story of the coming century." Eric Newton, Vice-President, Journalism Program, Knight Foundation 
"Environmental journalists in Indonesia and other developing countries are often quite isolated. They operate with few resources and face enormous pressures from vested interests, from advertisers, even from their own editors. So professional organizations like the SIEJ can provide crucial technical, financial and moral support." James Fahn, Executive Director Internews’ Earth Journalism Network (EJN) |
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