{"id":468982,"date":"2022-01-13T21:50:11","date_gmt":"2022-01-13T21:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asiapacificreport.nz\/?p=68644"},"modified":"2022-01-29T21:50:11","modified_gmt":"2022-01-29T21:50:11","slug":"boosting-pacific-digital-media-skills-amid-a-cyclone-all-part-of-the-job","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2022\/01\/13\/boosting-pacific-digital-media-skills-amid-a-cyclone-all-part-of-the-job\/","title":{"rendered":"Boosting Pacific digital media skills amid a cyclone \u2013 all part of the job"},"content":{"rendered":"
SPECIAL REPORT:<\/strong> By Michelle Betz in Ninole, Hawai’i<\/em><\/p>\n As Cyclone Cody got set to pummel Fiji in early January, students at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, Fiji were getting set to start a media training programme that would have them reporting on climate change.<\/p>\n \u201cMore than a little irony here,\u201d says Doug Mitchell, founder and director of Next Generation Radio<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve experienced weather related challenges but nowhere close to this level. Add in the global pandemic, case numbers soaring, our students across the International Dateline and a cyclone, wow.<\/p>\n “Still, we do what journalists do, we find a way to keep going. I can\u2019t say enough how proud I am of the professional team and a very special hat-tip to our folks in Fiji. They remained, undaunted.\u201d<\/p>\n Oceania is perhaps the most vulnerable region in the world to climate change, yet Pacific Islanders don\u2019t often have the opportunity to tell the world their climate change stories \u2013 stories about declining fisheries, increased cyclone activity, displacement and more.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is a difference when you are a local reporting an issue that directly affects you, it is more impactful — to be able to report climate change effects to Pacific Islanders, by a Pacific Islander\u201d, says Sera Tikotikovatu-Sefeti, one of nine USP students taking part in the Next Gen training programme.<\/p>\n The Next Gen Radio programme is a US-based digital media training initiative and the Fiji project was Next Gen\u2019s first ever international project. The Next Gen USP stories can be heard here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Cyclone set to threaten Fiji<\/strong> \u201cThe importance of our programme has never been more clear. We\u2019re not doing traditional reporting but finding people who have a story to tell, and we let them tell it,\u201d says Mitchell.<\/p>\n The choice of climate change as a theme for the workshops was not accidental.<\/p>\n\n
\nAnd the arrival of Cyclone Cody was set to threaten Fiji the same day the project was due to begin — illustrating not only the urgency of climate change but the need to ensure the region\u2019s journalists have the skills needed to tell those stories.<\/p>\n