11th Asia-Europe Foundation Journalists’ Seminar

 November 18, 2017

The 11th Asia-Europe Foundation Journalists’ Seminar was held yesterday morning at Tungapuri Hotel, Nay Pyi Taw and was attended by media representatives from member countries, media representatives from Myanmar and officials.

Ms. Natalia Ilieva of the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union, U Thiha Saw of Myanmar Press Council, freelance reporters Mr. Yermi Brenner of Germany and Ms. Samreen Khan Ghauri of Pakistan discussed the topic “Can constructive journalism support the implementation of sustainable development?”

Discussions covered the work processes of the media sector in implementation of sustainable development, raising the capacity of journalists, complications in reporting news of sustainable development, government as the main stakeholder for all to cooperate towards strong sustainable development and to cooperate with other organisations, requirement of special reporting by journalists on sustainable development and to report simply and clearly, the responsibility of journalists to point out and discuss the conduct of the government and to explain to the public about sustainable development in simple terms.

Next, Ms. Sophie Rytter of World’s Best News led a discussion on the topic “Constructive journalism and sustainable development goals.” In her discussion she said there is progress and change due to sustainable development in the world and reports on sustainable development must include not only the difficulties.

“Journalists need to search and report the ways and means of overcoming and resolving the difficulties. For this, good sources of the news need to be pursued. In order to achieve sustainable development, cooperation is required in dissimilar sectors. Both the bad and good news need to be reported. Only then can the benefits of the aims of the sustainable development will be known. Reporting must approach the real life situation of the public as much as possible’, Ms. Rytter said during her discussion.

In the afternoon session, Ms. Grazyna Pulawska of Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF), Information and Public Relations Department Deputy Director General Dr. Daw Thida Tin, freelance reporters Ms. Sharada Balasubramanian of India and Mr. Mate Halmos of Hungary discussed the subject of “Reactive to proactive reporting on climate change.”

The discussion included the need to transform from reactive to proactive reporting, as there are difficulties in reporting climate change, the effect of incorrect reporting on climate change, government responsibility to disperse facts on climate change incidents to the public proactively instead of reactively, increasing the involvement of not only the government sector but also the people in climate change and increasing the education and information works for the public. The Ministry of Information should also release proactive news on climate change, as Myanmar is one of the countries most affected by climate change. The discussion also included how to overcome the system of obtaining news from government departments that requires numerous steps and the importance of reporting proactively, as there are many challenges related to climate change. The ASEF invited Asia-Europe editors to hold a natural environment forum.

Research Director Mr. Tim Hill of Eco-Business Research then led the discussion on “Strategies in reporting on conserving the natural environment, constructive journalism and the aims of sustainable development”. Asia-Europe journalists discussed the difficulties and challenges in reporting about the natural environment.

The seminar will be continued on 19 November it is learnt.

Myanmar News Agency

Ref; The Global New Light of Myanmar