By Nick Phythian
Dust in the atmosphere from Africa’s arid Sahel region lessens the impact of hurricanes in the Americas.
This may be of little comfort to communities scratching a living in the sands of the Sahel but, for journalists taking part in a training workshop in Madrid, it offered an unexpected insight into the environmental forces shaping the future of our planet.
The workshop at the COP-8 conference on the UN Convention to Combat Desertification brought together 13 journalists, mostly from Sub-Saharan Africa, and focused on ways of protecting one of the world’s most precious resources – its soil.
“Interaction with the specialists gave us practical insights into what is really happening,” Dave Opiyo from Kenya’s Nation media group said afterwards.
Drought and desertification directly affect over 250 million people worldwide, fueling the migration that is a source of social instability in neighbouring countries and much further afield. Land degradation threatens the lives and livelihoods of over one billion people.
The September 10-12 workshop, organised by the COM+ alliance and conducted by Nick Phythian from the Reuters Foundation, allowed the journalists to work on their writing and news-gathering skills while covering the conference. It was also an opportunity to expand their network of contacts.
As COP-8 delegates wrestled with the organisational politics that often stifle multilateral efforts to help those in need, the journalists examined what weakens or kills the soil with experts from the World Bank and other specialist institutions.
The workshop offered insights into the science of land degradation, what the concept of ‘sustainable land management’ means in practice, the intricacies of the COP process, and the role of co-host TerrAfrica in addressing this issue.
“A good training session that opened up my journalist ‘eyes’ to see the story hidden in issues that seem pretty much normal,” Thelma Mwadzaya, a Kenyan working for Deutsche Welle radio’s Africa section, said afterwards.
The economics and politics of the battle to slow the march of the world’s deserts is a heady mix. In the fight for funds, the Convention is the poor relation to global warming and biodiversity, twin topics that have caught everyone's imagination.
But it’s often smart solutions that make good stories. Along with new technologies and policies, traditional wisdom – once dismissed as backward – is back in fashion, with scientists working hand-in-hand with communities who work the land.
“Many story ideas were generated,” commented Innocent Kahigana from Rwanda’s New Times Publication Company.
“I have learned to get the story behind the story,” added Hauwa Abubakar, a Nigerian with Deutsche Welle.
COM+ is a partnership to promote sustainable development. TerrAfrica co-hosted the workshop with the UNCCD secretariat and the CGIAR alliance for strategic scientific research.
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