Sunset on Thailand's Karon beach. Photo by BAZUKI MUHAMMAD
LONDON (AlertNet)- Some commentators argue that massive media output on the Asian tsunami has persuaded editors that humanitarian news is profitable, but others are scared it has pushed other disasters completely off the map.
At a debate organised by Reuters Foundation, a non-profit arm of Reuters news agency, journalists who covered the December 26 tsunami in the Indian Ocean said it would be easier for future aid stories to get coverage, but they still had to show news value.
"It's lowered the bar to get development stories on TV," said Andrew Gilligan, who reported from Sri Lanka for the London Evening Standard in the aftermath of the tsunami.
Others said the tsunami not only eclipsed other disasters, but knocked all other international emergencies out of the news.
New research commissioned by AlertNet found the tsunami got more media attention in the first six weeks after it struck than all of the world's top 10 "forgotten" emergencies combined have received in the past year, and squeezed out coverage of other humanitarian topics.
Graham Wood, head of policy for Ockenden International, a UK charity that works for refugees, said: "I think it's pushed development down the agenda."
Tim Cunningham, an executive producer who worked on tsunami coverage in Sri Lanka for Sky TV news, acknowledged that Sky had sent 50 journalists from London to cover the tsunami in Asia, but had just one reporter in Africa.
AFRICA ECLIPSED BY OTHER NEWSUnsurprisingly, Africa featured heavily in a survey by AlertNet to find out which crises aid experts thought had been most neglected by global media.
The experts chose Congo, northern Uganda, western and southern Sudan, West Africa, Colombia, Chechnya, Nepal and Haiti as the most neglected humanitarian hotspots.
They also drew attention to the global AIDS pandemic and other infectious diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis.
Gilligan said the main reason the tsunami got huge coverage while war in Sudan has faded from the front pages was it was new, wiping out lives from one minute to the next.
There is a consensus in the media industry that the tsunami was covered better than any previous disaster.
"I really do think, on the whole, it was pretty good, and a basis on which to build," Gilligan said.
Journalists said they'd been good at avoiding usual pitfalls of journalists parachuted into disaster zones.
DISASTER MYTHSInstead, Gilligan said, they dispelled myths about bodies causing disease.
"It always crops up, even though its almost always complete tosh," he said.
Gilligan said the media also argued against well-meaning but misguided international adoptions of newly orphaned babies, and tried to persuade people to donate cash instead of inappropriate old clothes.
Aid agencies said the scale of tsunami coverage was stunning, but warned the media not to be too self-congratulatory.
They accused journalists of focusing too much on helpless victims and ignoring recovery work by local people.
Ramesh Singh, chief executive of ActionAid International, said: "There was a lot about victims, as opposed to survivors??. It was very much about people going from here to there to help."
Gilligan said, from his point of view in Sri Lanka: "It was a story about how 30,000 people lost their lives in minutes. You can't tell it without sob stories."
Journalists said they couldn't cover disasters without pegging them to something new, and once they were interested, NGOs had to help them feed the 24-hour media machine.
FINDING THE STORY"You've got to broadcast all the time. You've got to think of something to say. Sometimes you're broadcasting so much you don't get much time to get out. That can lead to speculation," Gilligan said.
Cunningham admitted he had never been to Sri Lanka before the tsunami. "My knowledge consisted of a couple of print-outs. I'd been told I was going 30 minutes before."
Cunningham said that NGOs should help point journalists at stories in difficult places like Sudan.
"(Journalists) have to find ways to give history and background. There's no difference between that and telling a story on the Crufts dog championship...
"We would welcome someone from ActionAid or Ockenden telling us where to look."
Singh said, from the point of view of ActionAid: "What works for us is finding a real story and sustaining dialogue with the media."
From his experience responding to the tsunami from Chennai, India, he said NGOs came under intense pressure from journalists. "The international media was pushing us to deliver, whatever, but quick."
He said journalists could still find new angles for tsunami stories. "For many of the fishing folk who survived, the next tsunami is coming now, the disaster's just begun. Their lands are being grabbed and the government?? wants to put the beaches to commercial use."
INVEST IN TRAININGWood said: "It requires a journalist to be sensitive. It takes a long-term relationship (with NGOs)."
Mark Jones, editor of AlertNet, said NGOs needed to put more emphasis on training, and donors needed to be persuaded to fund it.
"Not enough people in press departments think like journalists," he said.
"It's a straightforward business decision. If you want more media coverage, you need to invest in it."
Click here for the transcript of the debate.
Read more about the AlertNet top 10 "forgotten" emergencies:- Congo war tops AlertNet poll of 'forgotten' crises
- FACTSHEET: AlertNet top 10 'forgotten' emergencies
- ANALYSIS: World's 'forgotten' crises scream for attention
- GRAPHIC: AlertNet top 10 'forgotten' emergencies
- AlertNet 'forgotten' crisis poll: who said what
- Tsunami coverage dwarfs forgotten crises, says research
- QUIZ: What do you know about forgotten emergencies?
- VIEWPOINT: Media short-sightedness is truly staggering
- FACTSHEET: Poll spotlights grim litany of crises
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