Reporting on climate change, taking sides
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As hectic talks get underway on day 10 of the climate change negotiations, mediapersons from hundreds of news channels are here in Denmark. How do these many media organizations report on climate change issues and does their reporting correspond to the political alliances of their own countries?
As I report here on climate change, I report on behalf my country and its concerns, but sometimes , also on the larger picture , on why cutting our greenhouse gas emissions is important and if we don't seal a deal at Copenhagen, it maybe too late. But one glance at what the wires report--and do understand many of the wire services are based in the developed world--reflect exactly that, the concerns of the rich nations. Unfortunately these wire services also provide news to media outfits in the developing world. So at the end of the day , we as the media in a subtle way are reporting the concerns of the rich nations without even realizing it. For instance today a story has been circulated on how a town in China is the biggest polluter. When you go back to the source of the story it's American. And that's how the global media drives the agenda for climate change. Which is why the buzz at the COP15 and the general perception continues to be that India and China are the villains , who are stalling the negotiations.
But can we single out the Americans or the rich nations for this bias? Arent we all at the end of the day reporters of our own country, and not one Planet Earth? It's a bias we are all guilty of as environment reporters and a concern we all need to address. As we report on the geopolitical posturing of our own countries and delegations some reflection is needed on our own biases. And another question- as the rich and the emerging economies battle it out- whose reporting for Planet Earth?
More about Bahar Dutt
Bahar Dutt is a wildlife conservationist by training. She has worked for the last ten years on crucial wildlife conservation projects in India and abroad. In England she worked at the world famous Jersey Zoo set up by naturalist Gerald Durrell and was involved in assessing the conditions for release of endangered primate in the Amazon forests. . She has over 10 awards to her credit including the Ramnath Goenka Award in 2006 and the Wildscreen Award , UK and the Young Environment Journalist Award 2007. As an environment editor at CNN-IBN she has done a range of stories travelling to far and forgotten corners of this country to expose the nexus between the mining mafia, politicians and corporates. She has posed as a furniture maker to expose the illegal trade in banned timber in the Western Ghats, and the nexus between the police and a mining company in the Niyamgiri hills of Orissa. One of her most dramatic exposés involved a cement company of global dimensions that had been operating illegally in the forests of Meghalaya on the India-Bangladesh border. More recently, she and the CNN-IBN team exposed the operations of a miner in Goa who had illegally devastated forest lands. Their story led to the shut down of the mine.Recent Posts
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