news bits
On [Earth Journalism Awards].
G’morning, bloggers!
Once again, we’re flagging down all journalists (professional, amateur and citizen alike) and the environmental-savvy to step up and sound out on climate change issues.
We received more information from our partner on the upcoming Earth Journalism Awards.
So here’s a little more info about the competition…
Professional journalists and citizen journalists from around the world are invited to apply to the Earth Journalism Awards through the EJA website (http://awards.earthjournalism.org) where they will be able to upload their climate change reports in any media until September 7 2009.
Internews’ Earth Journalism Awards encourages high-quality local climate change coverage leading up to the United Nations Climate Change Conference, December 8-18 2009 in Copenhagen (COP15). An independent international jury will select the Earth Journalism Award winners, who will be invited to participate in training, as well as given expert and logistics support so that they can accurately and efficiently report on the negotiations at the COP15.
The follow awards are available:
- Negotiation Award
- Human Voices Award
- Climate Change and Energy Award
- Adaptation Award
- Forests Award
- Climate Change and Nature Award
- Regional Award
- Global Public Award
- MTV Positive Change Award
Partners and sponsors of the Earth Journalism Awards include the COP15 host country, the Government of Denmark; MTV International; The World Bank; the Italian Ministry of Environment and the Protection of Territory and Sea; the V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation; the Edgerton Family Foundation; the Global Campaign for Climate Action; Flip Video Spotlight; and the Global Forum for Media Development.
Spread the fire through all channels. (Figuratively speaking, of course.) This is a great opportunity for journalists from all walks of life to participate.
In addition, Global for me will be hosting online climate change debates up until the Sept. 7 deadline. Speak out and let your voice be heard, and we’ll connect you with one of our journalists.
It’s all about connecting people like you to the reporters behind the news desk. No middle man or corporation involved.
Think on it. Let us know. E-mail us, comment on our blog or join us on Twitter with @GFMEditor.
Spread the word. The Earth Journalism Awards are coming.
Sincerely,
Kim
–GFM Team
E-mail your story ideas to 
Join our discussions on Twitter. @GFMEditor
List o’ Links:
• Our first post about our partnership with the Earth Journalism Awards.
• The list of our journalists on the Global Radio News website.
• Click for more information as well as competition rules from the EJA website.
• Create an account at the EJA website to upload your work. All submissions are valid if produced after Dec. 15, 2008.
Global for me blog 
I thought it was particularly inappropriate that part of the prize was a FLIGHT to Copenhagen.
That’s the reason I have no intention of submitting myself; I’m not a hypocrite.
http://thesietch.org/mysietch/keith/2009/06/08/earth-journalism-awards-win-a-flight/
farnishk – thanks for coming, and for your comment.
GFM tweeted this comment to raise discussion. You’re most definitely invited to join in on the debate.
Cheers. The thing is, I responded to them when I was sent the original press release, and didn’t get an answer. I know why they can’t see the problem with this — I’ve spent enough time with environmentalists to understand how blinkered they can be — but am very surprised you didn’t pick up on it.
Cheers too. GFM is partnered in the awards to help support freelance journalists and non-corporate, non-advertising-reliant news reporting alike. Climate change is the topic.
But that said, you raise an interesting point. Our tweet sounded off with one retweet (that we could track) on Twitter. We’ve also seen your blog. What do you think about pushing the issue of hypocrisy when connected to climate change? That, in itself, could be a story.
Not sure what you mean by “pushing the issue”, I do that already. If you want me to write a story for your blog, including some of the best bits from The Unsuitablog, then I’m willing: it would also tie in well with my latest article (which you are welcome to repost) on The Earth Blog:
http://earth-blog.bravejournal.com/entry/34507/
Please let me know by email (keith[at]theearthblog.org)
We haven’t solidified our guest post policy yet beyond blogging from our correspondents, but GFM is still nice and new, so we’ll see. Plenty of time to grow.
Although I think we found something that runs along the vein of your interests with this blog by our Simon Lane in Brazil…
http://blog.globalfm.com/2009/07/23/a-rubbish-story-literally-brazil-rejects-britains-shipped-rubbish/
The Australian Geologist Who’s Exposed the Hoax
http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/features/3755623/meet-the-man-who-has-exposed-the-great-climate-change-con-trick.thtml
disinter – thanks for coming, and for your comment.
Read the article & it prompted discussion over here. What do you think about the possibility of a journalist sending an anti-climate change story (so to speak) to EJA? It’s an angle, like all others, that should be reported.
The “hoax” is based on an outdated book that has very little science in it.
Here’s the exposee of the exposee 😀
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jul/10/ian-pilmer-climate-change-spectator
Thanks again, farnishk!
Dear GFM and Farnishk,
Thank you for your interest in the Earth Journalism Awards, and for your help in spreading the word about them. Internews is heartened by the response we have received, with nearly 500 journalists from around the world having registered their intention to submit stories for the awards.
One of our main goals in sponsoring these awards is to boost coverage of climate change issues, both in the year leading up to the summit and at Copenhagen itself. By bringing award winners to Copenhagen, we will be giving these journalists the opportunity to cover critically important negotiations, and to provide their audiences back home with locally relevant information they otherwise might not have received. In particular, the regional categories we’ve established help ensure some of the winning journalists will come from developing countries, which are generally most vulnerable to climate change, but where local people often have the least information about it, and local journalist have few means to cover the summits where their environmental future is being decided.
Regarding the issue of whether it is appropriate to fly award winners to the Copenhagen talks, unfortunately we don’t recall receiving any previous communications from Farnishk about the matter, but please do feel free send us any thoughts you may have at info @ internews.org. Rest assured that we are doing our best to pursue low-carbon options, and to offset all the greenhouse gases emitted by the awards ceremony and the attendant travel through a carbon-neutral plan that we are currently discussing with several vendors (details will be announced once the plan is finalized). We also realize that there is a lively debate about the effectiveness and ethics of carbon trading as a response to the challenge of climate change.
But Internews believes journalists have the right – the duty, even – to attend the Copenhagen talks, and cover the issues there as best they can. Given the great distances that many of our award winners, particularly from the Global South, will have to travel, we do not believe it is practical to ask them to travel by land and sea, nor is it likely there will be time for them to do so once the winners have been decided. (Actually, there is an interesting debate as to the greenest transport options; life cycle analyses show that air travel is not always the dirtiest means of travel: see http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=planes-trains-or-automobiles–air-t-2009-06-08).
Is it hypocritical for so many negotiators, inter-governmental officials, NGOs, journalists and other experts to “spend” so much carbon traveling to these mammoth climate change conferences? It’s an issue that often gets raised around the time of the UNFCCC summits, and the general response has been that this “carbon investment” is necessary to bring about an international agreement to protect our planet’s climate. We would add that, if we can also use this opportunity to raise public awareness about the challenge of climate change and ways to solve it, then it is a price worth paying.
Thanks for your engagement on this important issue.