04 Nov 2021, 15:40

Milou
Dirkx
Milou Dirkx is Journalism Network Manager at Clean Energy Wire. She is the first point of contact for the members of the CLEW Journalism Network, and develops events and other opportunities for climate and energy reporters to engage.

CLEW supports Climate Tracker on assessing energy and climate coverage in Latin America

Latin America is a region full of potential climate and energy transition stories, and just as many challenges to overcome when covering them. To better understand these complexities and how to best support journalists in the region, Clean Energy Wire is partnering with international non-profit organisation Climate Tracker to assess media coverage of the energy transition, boost networking opportunities and set up training sessions for Latin American journalists.

"We need to be more prepared to ask about sustainability topics in every article. Business, technology and scientific journalists should cover this topic as well," Argentinian journalist Maria Gabriela Ensinck told us when we discussed energy and climate media coverage in Latin America with several journalists working in the region. From our Berlin office our ability to assess how to best support journalists on a worldwide scale is often limited. Therefore, we tap into our global network, which now consists of over 270 journalists from 72 different countries. For better insights on Latin America, we are teaming up with the regional branch of Climate Tracker, which is leading this European Climate Foundation-supported project. We are looking forward to working closely with Chilean journalist – and CLEW network member – Francisco Parra, and Mexican science journalist Itzel Gómez.

CLEW will help Climate Tracker conduct a Latin America media assessment, build a regional network, set up training sessions and create a roadmap for the further development of energy reporting throughout the region. The working language will be Spanish and Portuguese, but the media assessment will be translated into English to give it a broad reach and help international organisations and media better understand the challenges faced by climate and energy journalists.

What now?

Climate Tracker is looking for 12 mid-career journalists from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Mexico to carry out the assessment. Those journalists will receive a four-week training and six of them will continue onwards to research energy transition coverage in their respective countries.

So if you are a journalist based in Argentina, Brazil, Chile Colombia, the Dominican Republic or Mexico and interested in this opportunity, you can find details on how to apply here.