Earth Journalism Network (EJN)

Networking is the central thrust of this media development initiative. EJN works with and launches broad networks of journalists around the world, including: Brazil, China, East Africa, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, Thailand, the Himalayan Region, the Middle East, the Philippines, and Vietnam. Drawing on these networks, EJN uses face-to-face encounters to train journalists in a wide variety of environmental issues, including climate change, biodiversity, water, environment health, and oceans and coastal resources. These journalists - working in print, radio, television, and online - to produce stories directly as a result of the training as well as environmental coverage they continue to produce afterwards.

Other examples of the strategy of collaboration include:

• EJN has formed a partnership with the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to launch the Biodiversity Media Alliance (BMA). This alliance was created to provide a resource to help journalists' reporting on the world's biodiversity, what its decline means for humanity, and how it can be tackled.
• EJN formed a partnership with ChinaDialogue.net to focus on the climate change issues affecting the Himalayan region and downstream countries. The Third Pole Project (3PP) was created to improve media coverage of the impacts of climate change on the region - most significantly, on the effect of melting glaciers on the major Asian river basins. Stories can be found on the 3PP website, which translates the content into English and Chinese.

The strategy of awards and recognition has also been central to EJN's work. In order to raise the quantity and quality of climate change media coverage around the world in the lead-up to the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, Internews launched and carried out the Earth Journalism Awards, a global media competition. EJN has also partnered with Panos and the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) to form the Climate Change Media Partnership (CCMP). CCMP has brought over 100 journalist fellows from developing countries and a variety of media to the 2007, 2008, and 2009 United Nations Climate Summits. CCMP fellows learn environmental reporting skills, meet with their delegation leaders or heads of state and collectively produce hundreds ofother non-profits to carry out fellowship programmes for events focusing on topics such as climate change, biodiversity, and water - where journalists from developing countries take part in capacity-building activities and reporting opportunities.

EJN's online network connects journalists from around the world with an interest in covering environmental issues. Various tools, resources, and conversation opportunities are offered.

Environment, Media Development.