Journalists’ competition offers US study tour

Journalists from South Africa, Zambia, Tanzania, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria can win a fully paid study tour to major US newsrooms as part of a new impactAFRICA reporting contest. Their entries must shed light on the challenges women and girls face in accessing health care and health services and solutions to improve the quality of life for them and their families.

Gender inequality is not just an abstract issue. It directly affects the health and lives of women and girls across the continent, as well as societies and communities. According to UNWomen, eight out of 10 of all new HIV patients are women. Girls across Africa still suffer from a lack of proper sanitation at schools, contributing to a higher dropout rate than amongst boys. A lack of family planning contributes to preventable deaths of women and to keeping a family in poverty. “African women are often the backbone of their communities and economies but many of the health challenges they face and the resulting impacts on society remain underreported. Poor media coverage translates into poor public understanding of the issues,” explains impactAFRICA programme manager Haji Mohamed Dawjee. “We are therefore looking for stories that help demystify complex issues and give both citizens and policymakers actionable information for better decision-making.”

An independent international jury will choose winners in three categories: best community impact; best audience engagement; and best use of data. The winners will spend 10 days visiting newsrooms in three cities in the US, learning from some of the world’s top digital media outlets.

Journalists should have published, broadcast or produced impactful stories on any platform and in any medium in at least one of the target countries during the period 15 November 2016 to 15 March 2017. The best submissions will highlight solutions and offer evidence that the reportage has had a positive impact on policies or services.

“All impactAFRICA winners help shine a light on blind spots in our societies, using digital and data journalism to help expose under-reported issues in ways that give people information they can use to make better informed decisions,” says Code for Africa director, Justin Arenstein.

“Our aim is to support journalism that engages and empowers people.” Culled from Bizcommunity