06/09/2009

Journalism and environmental policy

CARLOS EDUARDO LINS DA SILVA
ombudsman@uol.com.br

The priority given to topics related to sustainability is good news and shows how this concern is growing

Last Wednesday and Thursday, the headline on this newspaper was not about the topics that usually merit this distinction (politics and economy). It was about public environmental policy: deforestation in the Amazon and the imposition of limits on the emission of pollutants for gasoline- and ethanol-powered cars.

The priority given to topics related to sustainability is good news and shows how this concern has increased in Brazil. Such a change in the collective agenda of the country also is verified in the study "Climate Change in the Brazilian Press," which Andi (News Agency for the Rights of Children) releases Tuesday, when it can be accessed at www.mudancasclimaticas.andi.org.br. The survey monitored 50 newspapers between 2005 and 2008 and showed how space devoted specifically to problems such as the greenhouse effect, energy sources, consequences of climate change, and strategies to mitigate it, etc., has increased.

It also shows how the value given to coverage of these topics applied to the Brazilian context and specific to regions of the country have increased consistently.

It is obvious that things don't always go right and that there are still many problems to overcome, among them the lack of diversity of sources and conceptual misunderstanding of the material published, one of the topics, by the way, dealt with in the book shown below, which takes an activist and militant approach toward environmental journalism.

When I defended my master's thesis about mass media and the environment 33 years ago, the landscape was very diverse. Mention of ecological problems in the Brazilian media was rare and barely scratched the surface of topics approached. People like Ernesto Zwarg, who died 10 years ago at age 84, courageously launched diverse environmental consciousness-raising activities on the southern São Paulo coast in the 1970s as a precursor to the methods celebrated by Greenpeace, then considered exotic.

Now leaders travel between politics and environmentalism. Even the former vice president of the United States, Al Gore, abandoned public office to dedicate himself to warn the world about global warming and win the Nobel Prize and an Oscar (with the movie recommended below), and environmentalist Marina Silva is seen as a potential candidate for president of Brazil, with a good chance to capturing a large number of votes. The scientific, ideological and political complexity of environmental issues constitutes a big challenge for journalism. For example, this week, which was marked by news that the deforestation of the Amazon decreased in 2009, a good story in this newspaper showed that even with smaller rates of deforestation, it is possible that it caused increased carbon emissions. To be effective, journalism must report facts with precision, shrewdness and a critical spirit, which is always complicated, but especially crucial with environmental topics.

TO READ

"Communications, Journalism and the Environment," by Wilson de Costa Bueno, Mojoara Publishing, 2007 (starting at 18 reals, or U.S.$9.85)

TO SEE

"An Inconvenient Truth," by Davis Guggenheim, 2006 (starting at 19.90 reals)

CINEMA HELPS UNDERSTANDING OF JOURNALISM

Tuesday marked the start of the Folha Cycle of Cinema and Journalism, which goes through the first of December, as part of this month's commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the creation of the position of ombudsman at this newspaper.

Critic Sérgio Rizzo, one of the debaters Tuesday after "Citizen Kane" by Orson Welles (which has an excellent DVD with important extras, shown below), estimates there are about 300 movies in which journalists or journalism are central to the plot.

Fiction, in all its forms, could be an important instrument to stimulate productive reflection about people, activities and institutions because it exposes limiting circumstances, rare in life, which allow us to think about our real options and how to deal with them better.

The book by Stella Senra recommended below is a good example of how it can be fertile and useful to think about these people we are day to day who are amplified on the screen.

The cycle continues this Tuesday with "Ace in the Hole" by Billy Wilder, followed by commentary and debate with João Batista Natali, who was a correspondent in Paris and a special correspondent for Folha, and follows on Tuesdays at 7:30 p.m. in the Unibanco Space (1475 Augusta Street in São Paulo). More information: twitter.com/folhadebate

TO READ

"The Last Journalist," by Stella Senra, Estação Liberdade Publishing, 1997 (starting at 26.65 reals)

TO SEE

Citizen Kane, by Orson Welles, (Warner Home), 1941 (starting at 24.90 reals)

WHO IS LETTERS TO THE EDITOR?
Letters
from readers 54
from people in the news 8

Centimeters
from readers 418
from people in the news 114
*from Aug. 29 to Sept. 4, 2009

TOPICS MOST COMMENTED DURING THE WEEK

1. Offshore oil reserves
2. José Sarney (former president and current Senate leader)
3. Violence in São Paulo

WHAT FOLHA DID RIGHT...

INTERNATIONAL SCOOP

An exclusive interview on Wednesday with Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, in which the negotiator of the Honduran crisis will allow accepting the results of the November elections, has international repercussions

CLEAN CARS
On Friday, a story shows that domestic industry already manufactures cars which pollute less, but only for export

... AND WHERE IT DID BADLY

CONFLICTING INFORMATION
On Saturday, Aug. 30, the national edition says that Supreme Court Chief Justice Joaquim Barbosa will conduct an inquiry into José Sarney, while the São Paulo edition says the investigator will be Eros Grau; on Monday, the front page of the sports section says Miranda will be sold to Europe and another story says he will stay in São Paulo

HELIÓPOLIS

Once again urban violence is treated as a fortuitous police matter without discussing its possible structural causes

OFFSHORE OIL
Excessive attention to criticism of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva over the development scheme for the offshore oil fields reduces the topic to partisan bickering

WORTH REMEMBERING
Cases that need to be looked at again

The governor of the northeastern state of Pará visits Folha one day before a year has passed without information in the newspaper about investigations into the deaths of dozens of babies in Santa Casa Hospital in Belém in 2008, and still the topic did not come up

Translation by John Wright