Environmental and developmental reporting

Sobhapati Samom *

Introduction

Media is crucial part of lives in learning process, knowledge dissemination, information gathering and opinion maker. That is why media’s role is that of the fourth estate. It shapes a nation, the people living there and how they live, think and act.

Despite the growth of social media in the last few years, it is still the (conventional) media that influences public opinion. Look up the website of any leading English daily in the country: ‘Environment’ is usually not a marker you can reach easily; few popular national news papers have certain sections on science and environment, but others just do not have the label except occasionally.

In Manipur with more than 30 daily newspapers including 10 in four hill districts-Churachandpur, Senapati, Tamenglong and Ukhrul, ten periodicals and eight of cable news channels including 5 in Churachandpur district alone, the space and time allotted in the media for coverage of Nature and environmental issues is negligible.

So far, no newspapers in State capital have a dedicated page for the environment and development activities except a weekly or monthly column in just one or two papers unlike sports, political and social issues pages/spaces. This may result in public apathy, ignorance and unresponsiveness about the burning issues of biodiversity or eco-systems resources, wildlife and other developmental schemes.

It is estimated that more than 80 percent of the common people learn about nature and environment related issues only through the print and audio-visual media. But unfortunately media here are as yet not sufficiently empowered to evoke a positive chance by prioritizing and communicating issues effectively and imparting to them the much required merits due to certain factors.

Environmental and Developmental Reporting

A major reason for the situation could be because of lack of proper training resource for people functioning in the various sections of the media. So time has come to include environmental journalism as a part of formal media curricula (as small state like Sikkim incorporates environment education in their school curriculum).

Though there are reports of few institutions offering media related courses with nature and environmental journalism (in India), according to reports most of them reportedly focus on the urban issues and issues of industrial waste management.

Thus environmental journalism is yet to develop as a full-fledged field within journalism. There are a hundred stories waiting to be done but not enough reporters who take the trouble to work on them in depth as environment and wildlife issues are gradually gaining greater prominence in the press and some stories are even making it to the front page or main news desk.

Again media need to take up the volatile issues of our environment and development activities in their routine works by enhancing their skills.

For this we really need to use simple and shortest readers friendly language by avoiding scientific jargons (or try to compare the units with objects to make it readers friendly. For example Imphal requires about 16 petrol tankers daily instead of Imphal requires 160 kiloliters of petrol daily).

Read as much as you can about wildlife and environmental issues. Begin by building your portfolio by writing for local dailies or periodicals or making documentaries for smaller media houses.

We need to discuss and write on the fundamental pointers in principles, sustainability, biodiversity, water, forests, land, wildlife, law, and climate change etc if we’re are going to write or educate common people on nature, environmental and development issues in Manipur by establishing better network with subject experts in diverse fields (including the scientists for their new findings or data).

For stories, we can also focus on various parts or sections of the National Action Plan on Climate Change such as -National Mission for enhanced energy efficiency, National Water Mission, National Mission for a ‘Green India’, National Mission for Sustainable agriculture, National Mission on strategic knowledge for climate change, National Mission for sustaining the Himalayan eco-system besides other developmental activities such as Smart City and other projects.

Useful Resources :

Ashoka Trust for Research in ecology and the environment ( www.atree.org),
Bombay Natural History Society (www.bnhs.org) ,
Centre for Environment Education (www.ceeindia.org),
Centre for Science and Environment (www.cseindia.org) ,
Centre for Sustainable Development (www.csdindia.in),
Centre for Wildlife studies (www.cwsindia.org),
Environmentalist Foundation of India (www.indiaenvironment.org),
Forest Research Institute (fri.icfre.gov.in),
Greenpeace India (www.greenpeace.org/india/en) ,
Indian Environmental Society (www.iesglobal.org),
MS Swaminathan Research Foundation (www.mssrf.org),
National Green Tribunal (www.greentribunal.gov.in),
People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (www.petaindia.com),
Solar Energy Society of India (www.sessi.in),
The Energy and Resources Institute (www.teriin.org),
Wildlife Trust of India (www.wti.org.in).

Some of the institutions such as CSE, CEE, ICIMOD have been organizing capacity building programmes for the journalists round the year in the form of workshops or media briefings.

For Photo https://www.metrophotochallenge.com/
For Flowers: http://www.flowersofindia.net/
For water data http://data.thethirdpole.net/

Write to [email protected] with details (location, name, contacts, brief description of environmental writing/films) to learn more about environmental journalists in India. You can also visit http://feji.org.in/ or for International sectors visit https://ijnet.org/ orhttp://www.sej.org/ etc