The Green Line: Environmental Journalists Ponder Service to Public

On the occasion of a meeting of the Mexican Environmental Journalists Network, Talli Nauman considers the conventional journalistic ethic purporting that informing - not educating - is the job of media, and argues that environmental journalists must be more than simple informers to provide better coverage of development issues. She discusses the "vast border zone" between the two and suggests that the current code is a "condition of a structural relationship between the newsroom on one hand, and major advertisers and investors, on the other. The latter holds sway since it sustains and assures the economic survival of profit-motivated media."


The result, states Nauman, is that most environmental content in conventional media is confined to opinion, editorial, and special supplement sections of publications. However, the author asserts that "[t]he needs of the listening, viewing and reading public should be a greater determinant of the content than the monetary yield for corporate interests behind news organizations," especially for sectors just emerging from illiteracy or suddenly faced with the cultural clashes introduced by globalisation. Non-profit media is a possible outlet that can respond to these needs, according to the author.
Community radio, which has a 40-year history in Mexico beginning with Radio Huayacocotla and Radio Teocelo and now including more than 24 stations, is a response to the changing needs for information and outlets for environmental information beyond the conventional media.


Nauman suggests that environmental journalists in Latin America already traditionally conceive their roles as being more than informers. They see themselves as practicing "preventative journalism" and functioning as social communicators for sustainable development, or, in the words of author Adán Castillo Galástica "an apostolate, a rural teacher, trailbreaker, trusty sentry, permanent beacon, fortune teller, provocateur of solidarity."


In concluding that environmental journalists can do the public a great service, Nauman states, "If Castillo sets the bar high for some of us, he nonetheless sets the stage for acknowledgement that coverage of 21st century Latin American environment and development requires practitioners to delve into questions that will reveal whether legal frameworks, enforcement, and public participation mechanisms are sufficient to warrant slated projects. Besides keeping these conditions in mind, environmental journalists can balance coverage more by providing positive examples of sustainable development that helps consumers take action."