Showing posts from category media.
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7 Billion: Reporting on Population and the Environment
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“It’s an issue – population – that is immensely diverse in its effects and repercussions, and it’s a great opportunity for reporting,” said Jon Sawyer, executive director of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting at a November 1 roundtable discussion at the Wilson Center. The session, reporting on population and the environment connections, also featured Dennis Dimick, executive environment editor at National Geographic; Kate Sheppard, environment reporter for Mother Jones; and Heather D’Agnes, foreign service environment officer at USAID.
“It’s an issue – population – that is immensely diverse in its effects and repercussions, and it’s a great opportunity for reporting,” said Jon Sawyer, executive director of the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting at a November 1 roundtable discussion at the Wilson Center. The session, reporting on population and the environment connections, also featured Dennis Dimick, executive environment editor at National Geographic; Kate Sheppard, environment reporter for Mother Jones; and Heather D’Agnes, foreign service environment officer at USAID.The PBS NewsHour segment on “seven billion” featuring collaboration with the Pulitzer Center and National Geographic.
A Cumulative Discussion
“I ended up covering reproductive rights and health issues because I saw a need and a gap in coverage,” said Kate Sheppard. “I had been an environmental reporter for years…and so it sort of became this add-on beat for me.” But, she emphasized, they are actually very related issues.
“It’s a cumulative discussion,” said Dennis Dimick, speaking about National Geographic’s “7 Billion” series this year. “[Population] really hasn’t been addressed that much in media coverage over the past 30 years, in this country at least, and I think that the idea was that it wasn’t really just a discussion about the number seven billion, which is a convenient endline and easy way to get into something, but really to talk about the meaning of it, and the challenges and the opportunities that means for us as a civilization living on this planet.”
The series has had stories on ocean acidification, genetic diversity of food crops, the transition to a more urban world, as well as case studies from Brazil, Africa’s Rift Valley, and Bangladesh. “What we are trying to do in this series is really paint a broad picture to try to unpack all these issues and try to come at this question in sort of broad strokes,” Dimick said. “It’s sort of like we are orchestrating a symphony. Even though it’s a printed magazine, it’s a multimedia project – more than just words and more than just pictures.”
Collaborative Reporting
The Pulitzer Center, a non-profit journalism organization that seeks to fill gaps in coverage of important systemic issues, was able to commission pieces for PBS NewsHour that complemented the National Geographic series. This population collaboration launched the Center’s own initiative on population. “Our hope was that by having that platform, and the visibility of National Geographic and NewsHour, that it would bring attention to the rest of our work,” Sawyer said. The Pulitzer Center has gateways on water, food insecurity, climate change, fragile states, maternal health, women and children, HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean, and Haiti, in addition to population.
Playing off a story that was already making world headlines, the Pulitzer Center supported reporting by freelance journalist Ellen Knickmeyer on the demographic dimensions of the Arab Spring, and particularly the role of young people. The stories explored youth’s frustration at high unemployment and lack of prospects, their roles in the revolutions, and their expectations for the future.
“Of course, we had the advantage that the world was interested in North Africa because of the amazing events that were taking place, but it was an opportunity to get them to look at the other dimension to it,” Sawyer said.
Based on a model developed to cover water and sanitation in West Africa, the Pulitzer Center also created a partnership with four African journalists to produce reporting on reproductive health that will be distributed in both international and African media outlets. “They have important things to say to American audiences, to international audiences,” Sawyer said. “And so we see this project as an opportunity to bring them into the international media discussion.” The journalists will be reporting from the upcoming International Conference on Family Planning in Dakar, Senegal, later this month.
Advocating Discussions
“It’s really a nuanced discussion, and that is why covering these topics, and looking at all the different aspects of it, is really important,” said USAID’s Heather D’Agnes. Furthermore, speaking as a development practitioner, she emphasized the importance of offering solutions, such as family planning, as part of an integrated development approach.
“In our journalism we don’t pretend not to have arguments, or ideas, or thoughts about the issues we are covering,” said Sheppard, speaking of Mother Jones. “I think that the value is that you tell the story well and you do solid reporting – that gives people a more informed perspective.” Especially with complicated issues, like population and the environment, “people find it more accessible if you have a perspective…they can associate better with a story if you walk them through the process you have gone through as a reporter.”
“What we are really trying to do is to advocate a discussion of issues that aren’t getting well-aired in other media,” said Dimick. Sometimes you need to find an interesting or counterintuitive framework, such as the National Geographic story about rural electrification and TV novelas in Brazil. It started as a story about the booming popularity of soap operas, but also created the opportunity to talk about gender equity, family planning, and other complex issues. While the magazine does not advocate a position, like the editorial page of a newspaper might, Dimick said, they do use case studies to guide readers through the range of risks, choices, and opportunities and to help them understand their implications.
Event ResourcesVideo Credit: “World’s Population Teeters on the Edge of 7 Billion — Now What?,” courtesy of PBS NewsHour; “7 Billion, National Geographic Magazine,” courtesy of National Geographic. -
Good Company: ‘New Security Beat’ Honored for Best Population Commentary
›The Population Institute’s 2011 Global Media Awards go to a Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, the head of the UN Population Fund, PBS NewsHour – and us! We’re thrilled to announce that the New Security Beat has won its third Global Media Award for Best Online Commentary or Blog.
Our company in this year’s line-up is impressive:- PBS NewsHour, for several segments related to population issues, including one on an Indonesian plant showing promise for male birth control and another on how religion and tradition are clashing with family planning efforts in Guatemala;
- Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, Executive Director of UNFPA, for his editorial in Science, “Population and Development;”
- EarthSky: A Clear Voice for Science, for their series of weekly interviews with scientists around the world, including a series with population experts.
- Population Action International (PAI), for their short film Weathering Change, which tells stories about the impact of climate change on women from Ethiopia, Nepal, and Peru (and which was launched at the Wilson Center).
New Security Beat also got a nice shout-out from Andy Revkin on Dot Earth this week for our “seven billion” stories and coverage from South by Southwest Eco. For more on “seven billion” be sure to read Elizabeth Leahy Madsen’s breakdown of how we got to this milestone, Geoff Dabelko’s take on seven ways seven billion will affect the planet, the webcast of our recent reporting on population and environment event, and our latest YouTube videos, including PAI’s Roger-Mark De Souza presenting at South by Southwest Eco. -
El Niño, Conflict, and Environmental Determinism: Assessing Climate’s Links to Instability
›October 5, 2011 // By Schuyler NullA recent Nature article on climate’s impact on conflict has generated controversy in the environmental security community for its bold conclusions about links between the global El Niño/La Niña cycle and the probability of intrastate conflict.
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Babatunde Osotimehin Answers Seven Questions on Population
›PSI’s Impact magazine has an interview up with UNFPA Executive Director Babatunde Osotimehin asking him seven questions about population. It’s not likely this will be the last seven-something-themed story as we approach October and the expected seven billion mark for global population, but Karl Hofmann, president and CEO of PSI, asks some good questions, including on the prospect of harnessing the “demographic dividend” and about the barriers facing more integrated development efforts – a critical topic in population, health, and environment (PHE) circles.
On the demographic dividend:Karl Hofmann: Demography can be a key to progress with the right policy environment in place, but it can also be a burden when we don’t have the right framework in place to take advantage of growing populations. Some have described this as the demographic dividend – growing populations as a potent driver of economic growth and development. Give us your perspective on that.
And on integrated development:
Babatunde Osotimehin: I spoke at the 17th African Union Summit this year and one of my messages was that we have the opportunity right now to take advantage of the demographic dividend of young people. It’s important for African governments to understand that they have a youthful population. Most of Africa is under the age of 35. If 85 percent of the African population is under 35, the implication is that you have to have education, social services, housing, all of that, tailored to meet the needs of this population.
Beyond that, given what we’ve seen with the Arab spring uprising and others in many parts of the developing world, young people who are out of work want education and economic opportunities. We want to appeal to member states to provide skills appropriate to development and also ensure that we have continuing conversations with young people about their reproductive health and rights so they can make the choices that will ensure they plan for their families.KH: There are lots of conversations going on in global health circles these days around the synergy of integration. From your perspective, what are the barriers to this integration?
Read the full interview on Impact.
BO: I think it’s bipolar. Some countries are satisfied with vertical programs. Others are resistant to changing their system at the request of a donor. One argument for integration is that you can have the one-stop shop situation where one, two, three trained providers can deliver services at the same time. These include integration of HIV counseling, testing and treatment with family planning, with health education for non-communicable diseases, with immunization for children or with maternity services.
When you look at the components of an integrated system, it is very easy to sell. In terms of investment, it makes sense for the governments to build and put this together. The supervision becomes a lot easier, and the training of health workers would then capture all of the skill sets that would be required. Some countries, like India, Ethiopia and Nigeria have started this kind of integration.
Sources: PSI.
Image Credit: Adapted from UNFPA. -
Edward Carr, Open the Echo Chamber
Food Security and Conflict Done Badly…
›The original version of this article, by Edward Carr, appeared on Open the Echo Chamber.
Over at the Guardian, Damian Carrington has a blog post arguing that “Food is the ultimate security need.” He bases this argument on a map produced by risk analysts Maplecroft, which sounds quite rigorous:The Maplecroft index [represented on the map], reviewed last year by the World Food Programme, uses 12 types of data to derive a measure of food risk that is based on the UN FAO’s concept. That covers the availability, access and stability of food supplies, as well as the nutritional and health status of populations.
I’m going to leave aside the question of whether we can or should be linking food security to conflict – Marc Bellemare is covering this issue in his research and has a nice short post up that you should be reading. He also has a link to a longer technical paper where he interrogates this relationship…I am still wading through it, as it involves a somewhat frightening amount of math, but if you are statistically inclined, check it out.
Instead, I would like to quickly raise some questions about this index and the map that results. First, the construction of the index itself is opaque (I assume because it is seen as a proprietary product), so I have no idea what is actually in there. Given the character of the map, though, it looks like it was constructed from national-level data. If it was, it is not particularly useful – food insecurity is not only about the amount of food, but access to that food and entitlement to get access to the food, and these are things that tend to be determined locally. You cannot aggregate entitlement at the national level and get a meaningful understanding of food insecurity – and certainly not actionable information.
Continue reading on Open the Echo Chamber.
Image Credit: “Estimated food security conditions, 3rd Quarter 2011 (August-September 2011),” courtesy of the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) and USAID. -
Deborah Mesce, Behind the Numbers
Kenya’s New Data Website Puts the Ball in Media’s Court
›The original version of this article, by Deborah Mesce, appeared on PRB’s Behind the Numbers blog.
The Kenya government took a bold step toward transparency a few weeks ago when it fired up its Open Data website and posted loads of data in a format that makes the information easily understood by the average person. The data sets include national census statistics as well as government spending, and the government promises more data to come. This is a boon for journalists willing to wade into the numbers to examine what’s going on in their country and hold their government accountable. I’m waiting now to see how they will use this new tool.
We always hear that information is power, but that works only if the information is used. Lots of information begins as numbers, statistics, and data sets, with lots of good stories tucked away in there to be found by the journalist willing to go the extra mile, examine the numbers, and do the math. In many developing countries, the information – numbers, statistics, data sets – isn’t easily accessible, if it is available at all. Governments keep a tight hold on it, or if it’s made available, the average person would be hard pressed to make heads or tails out of it.
Continue reading on Behind the Numbers.
Image Credit: Open Data. -
Watch ‘Dialogue’ TV on the Future of Women and the Arab Spring
›This week on Dialogue, host John Milewski discusses the role that women played in the Arab Spring and how these roles might evolve in the coming months and years with the enormous political changes sweeping the region. He is joined by Moushira Khattab, Lilia Labidi, and Haleh Esfandiari. [Video Below]
Moushira Khattab is a human rights activist who formerly served as Minister of Family and Population for Egypt. She also served as Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs, Vice Chair of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, and was Egypt’s ambassador to South Africa during the Mandela era. Lilia Labidi is an anthropologist and professor at the University of Tunis who currently serves as Minister of Women’s Affairs in the Republic of Tunisia. Previously she was a visiting professor at the American University in Cairo and a fellow at the Wilson Center. Haleh Esfandiari is author of the book, My Prison My Home: One Women’s Story of Captivity in Iran. Haleh serves as the director of the Wilson Center’s Middle East Program.
Dialogue is an award-winning co-production of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and MHz Networks that explores the world of ideas through conversations with renowned public figures, scholars, journalists, and authors. The show is also available throughout the United States on MHz Networks, via broadcast and cable affiliates, as well as via DirecTV and WorldTV (G19) satellite.
Find out where to watch Dialogue where you live via MHz Networks. You can send questions or comments on the program to dialogue@wilsoncenter.org. -
Yemen Beyond the Headlines: Governance, State Capacity, and the U.S.
›Part two of the “Yemen Beyond the Headlines: Population, Health, Natural Resources, and Institutions” event, held at the Wilson Center on May 18.
“Moving beyond Ali Abdullah Saleh has proved to be very challenging, not only for the Yemeni people, but for the neighboring countries and for the international community as a whole,” said former U.S. Ambassador to Yemen Edmund Hull, one of a number of speakers on governance and future challenges during the all-day conference, “Yemen Behind the Headlines: Population, Health, Natural Resources, and Institutions,” at the Woodrow Wilson Center. [Video Below]
Don’t Throw Out the Good With the Bad
Yemen’s protest movement is different than those of Egypt or Tunisia because neighboring countries, such as those in the Gulf Cooperation Council, are actively involved. “[They] don’t have the luxury of saying this is a purely Yemeni affair,” said Hull. “They have to identify where their national interests are and then they have to come up with a legitimate and effective way of protecting those interests.” Included in those national interests is dealing with the presence of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
But, Hull said, “It would be a shame if, as part of this revolution, what was good in Yemen gets tossed out with what was bad.” Among the institutions that should be protected are the Social Fund for Development, a government development initiative designed to reduce poverty , and the Central Security Forces, “still a very necessary institution and one that has to be protected if other challenges in Yemen are to be met,” he said.
“It’s a mistake to over-focus on the end of a regime – yes, it’s important to get a transfer of power, but I would argue [that it is] equally important to institutionalize the forces that have led to this, as a safeguard against the counter revolution and as an impetus to meeting those many, many political challenges that Yemen faces.”
Going forward, Hull said that elections will be key: Yemen had good electoral experiences in 2003 and 2006 but the system has since suffered some “backsliding,” he said. He also emphasized the importance of letting the youth participate, protecting social networking systems and NGOs, instituting legal requirements to promote transparency, and freeing up and protecting the media. “Unless you have a media spotlight, abuses are going to accumulate,” he said.
Not a “Basket-Case”
“Yemen is not a basket case,” said Charles Schmitz, an associate professor at Towson University. “There have been substantial achievements that I think we need to take into account.” Among these achievements, he highlighted Yemen’s growth in life expectancy, literacy rates, and gross domestic product. The country’s population growth rate has also slowed over the past two decades, though its total fertility rate remains one of the highest in the region.
These gains were fuelled by two resource booms, Schmitz explained: mainly, remittances from the construction boom in the 1970s and oil production. However, oil production dropped off dramatically after peaking around 2001, and remittances have not been able to keep up with the growth of the economy.
“Yemen is in a very severe crisis,” Schmitz said. “The oil has stopped… the balance of payments has been going negative for the last couple of years… and the government appears to be dipping into the central bank.” As a result, he said there is a “very real” possibility of the currency – the riyal – collapsing. The currency represents trust in the government, of which there is none right now, he said.
An Opportunity for New Thinking
“The key variable to the future of the Yemeni economy is state capacity, and this is something Yemen has not done well thus far, largely because of the political crisis,” Schmitz said.
“I think we must be attuned to the reality around us,” said Jeremy Sharp, a specialist in Middle Eastern affairs with the Congressional Research Service. “Quite frankly, Yemen needs a lobby in this country. Yes we have a tight budget environment, but it’s also an opportunity for new thinking.”
“The degree and extent of U.S. engagement with Yemen…is based primarily on the perceived terrorist threat there,” said Sharp. “Our policy toward Yemen always seems to be one horrific terrorist attack away from public outcries for deeper U.S. involvement – i.e., military involvement.”
A Cycle of Transitions?
“We may be looking at cycles of transition in Yemen over the coming decades,” said Ginny Hill, an associate fellow with the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House. “Stable political settlements take time.” The street protestors are not going to get what they want in the short term, “but just two or three of them sitting in government or being involved in the negotiation process… is going to change the dialogue in Yemen,” she said.
The United States has difficult questions to answer, said Sharp: Who will control Yemen’s security forces down the line? How will the next leader deal with the U.S.-Yemen partnership? Will power be fragmented between civilian and military leaders? Will the next leader play the nationalist card and reduce cooperation with the United States to bolster their own public standing?
“In the absence of the degree of engagement that we need, the [U.S. government] aims high rhetorically,” said Sharp. “We speak about these things while pursuing our own national security goals on the ground. Perhaps this path is unsustainable and events will force the U.S. to pay even more attention to Yemen. Or perhaps we will continue to muddle along this path and never quite reach the brink, precipice, or impending crisis that is so routinely predicted in the media.”
See parts one and three of “Yemen Beyond the Headlines: Population, Health, Natural Resources, and Institutions” for more from this Wilson Center event.
Sources: UNICEF, World Bank.
Photo Credit: “Even small children…,” courtesy of flickr user AJTalkEng.
