WEMECO launches handbook to guide journalists on climate change reporting
Charles Batambuze, a board member of WEMECO, stated that launched handbook is a resource to improve the way journalists report about climate change not only in the albertine region but the country at large.
Western Media for Environment and Conservation (WEMECO) recently in Masindi district launched a Comprehensive Guide to Climate Change Reporting: A Handbook for Journalists to help them report effectively on climate change and environmental issues.
Charles Batambuze, a board member of WEMECO, stated that launched handbook is a resource to improve the way journalists report about climate change not only in the albertine region but the country at large.
“Climate change now is the HIV of the 80s and 90s. Climate change is the big talk now and we must know how to report about it. We need to report in such a way that communities know how to relate with nature,” Batambuze said.
He noted that with the right skills and knowledge about climate change, journalists can make news reports that will make policy makers consider these issues and compele civil society organisations to take action.
The executive director of WEMECO, Peter Akugizibwe Araali, speaking at the launch noted that climate change is a ‘pressing issue of our generation, yet it remains underreported, especially in Uganda.’
Training
The launch of the handbook coincided with a training that targeted fifteen female journalists from the albertine districts of Hoima, Masindi, Kiryandongo and Bulisa.
Akugizibwe said that they are focusing on female journalists because when climate change strikes, it is the women and children who suffer most yet women in the media space have not been giving it attention.
We want you to write about it so that it gets the attention it deserves, he advised.
The Executive Director of Earth Rights Initiative, Hussein Muyinda Kato, tipped female journalists at the training to provide solution based journalism when covering environment stories because that is how it shows that they understand the problem at hand.
Flavia Ajok, a journalists with UG Reports, a news website, said the skills acquired from the training will enable her tell the climate challenges in her news reports while Ramula Namatembe, the station Mmanager of Biiso FM, urged media house owners to allocate more time and space for journalists to tell more climate change stories.
