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This year, EJN launched a global project to highlight the grave impacts of marine pollution and efforts to curb and regulate them, as part of our Ocean Media Initiative, with the aim of improving the quality and quantity of ocean-related stories in the media and building the capacity of journalists to understand and cover under-reported ocean-related issues more effectively.
With support from the Paul M. Angell Family Foundation, EJN has awarded story grants to nine journalists from nine different countries:
- Dwi Arief Priyono, Indonesia — Project Multatuli
- Samantha Magick, Fiji — Islands Business
- Gianluca Liva, Italy — RADAR Magazine
- Mara Isabella Budgen, Japan — LifeGate
- Mauricio de Azevedo Ferro, Brazil — Correio Sabiá
- Katie Marion Biggar, South Africa — Daily Maverick
- Smitha T.K., India — The Quint
- Arianna Poletti, Tunisia — Inkyfada
- Geela Garcia, Philippines — South China Morning Post
With support from EJN mentors, these journalists will produce reports that shed light on the many different sources of marine pollution. Stories will focus on the long-ranging effects of radioactive waste dumped at sea by Japan; efforts to curb the plastic pollution crisis in the Pacific Islands; how the world’s demand for fast fashion has led to dyes and other effluents being dumped into Tunisia’s coastal waters by a growing number of poorly regulated textile factories; the risks to marine biodiversity in the Philippines, posed by air and noise pollution created by a large-scale bridge infrastructure project; the impacts of nutrient runoff from industrial agriculture in Indonesia, which has led to a disturbing boom in jellyfish populations, and more.
“With plastic pollution in the world’s oceans doubling every six years, while the impacts of other forms of marine pollution (light, noise, thermal, radioactive, etc) remain under-reported, we’re pleased to support these journalists to draw more attention to this crisis,” says Amrita Gupta, EJN’s editor and high seas project manager. “EJN mentors will encourage grantees to explore policy and governance measures that could curb these threats, even as they highlight the challenges inherent in addressing them effectively.”
Look out for these stories on the EJN website in coming months.
Banner image: Eutrophication is a human-caused change in the ocean that has likely contributed to jellyfish explosions / Credit: Shin-ichi Uye via Mongabay.
