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Revenue is drying up, job cuts are rife, advertising is rapidly diminishing. Jobs like mine, as a climate editor, are increasingly scarce.
Niche journalism in fields such as health, education and the environment is hard to come by without donor or grant funding.
And as climate change edges its way to being the greatest threat and challenge for this and the generations to come, it is sad that jobs such as mine are no longer affordable.
Google Ads and Facebook have overtaken the market, with clients placing their products on these platforms rather than in newspapers. And Google takes the work of the news media without paying for it.
The media industry has, for many years, been characterised by job cuts, poor freelance rates and fewer senior journalists. Of the remaining staff, many are juniors for which there is no budget or time to adequately train.
Quality journalists have chosen other career paths, as have many quality editors, moving into jobs in areas such as public relations.
The result is poor quality journalism, which is a threat to democracy.
It means journalists can’t play their watchdog role, which leads those in power not being held accountable.
It seems that donor-funded journalism is the only media in the country staying afloat.
Not bound by the pressures of meeting sales targets and chasing revenue, these news outlets do their work while hoping their funders will not pull the plug. Colleagues who worked at New Frame will know the devastation of having a donor doing just that.
Media houses such as News24 and the Daily Maverick also face financial problems — as does the Mail & Guardian.
As Daily Maverick reported earlier this year: “As part of ongoing efforts to ensure Daily Maverick’s long-term stability and success, the company is initiating a reduction of about 15% of operating costs.”
News24 also announced the closures of print editions Beeld, Rapport, City Press and the Daily Sun. Fortunately for staff, reporters would be shifted to digital operations.
Journalists in South Africa must tread carefully, particularly when reporting about corruption and whistleblowers or working in high-crime areas.
There are instances where senior journalists have had to be allocated private bodyguards by their media houses — but at least we in South Africa are still able to do our work.
These are all serious problems, but in another part of the world, journalists face something far worse — death.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reports that, in 2024, the places where reporters and photographers are most likely to be killed are Haiti and Gaza. These two countries “are the world’s biggest offenders in letting journalists’ murderers go unpunished”, according to CPJ.
The other most dangerous countries for journalists are Somalia, Syria, South Sudan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Mexico, Philippines, Myanmar, Brazil, Pakistan and India.
Israel has killed 128 reporters in Gaza. Recently, three more were killed in Lebanon when Israeli jets hit accommodation for journalists in the town of Hasbaya.
The killing of reporters is an attack on our freedoms, an international war crime, yet Israel continues to act with impunity, to carry out its crimes regardless of condemnation and without fear of reprisal.
Israel tries to stop journalists from reporting on what is happening in Gaza, and reporters in the region are targeted and smeared as terrorists when they are killed by the Israel Defense Forces.
We are today forced to watch a genocide on our phones, on social media, where people document the carnage they face.
It is an Orwellian, dystopian world we are living in.
My heart aches for colleagues in Gaza. This is an international media crisis and should be regarded as such. Funders of Israel need to take notice of these crimes and reconsider their support.
My profession is under threat, locally and internationally. I don’t know what the future holds or how to fix the problem. Finding funding for local media needs to happen swiftly.
Big tech companies such as Google and Facebook need to come to the party; that revenue that they’re grabbing should be directed to sustaining media houses.
The government must realise the importance of a free media for the sake of democracy.
As for climate journalism, or more broadly, science journalism, it needs help. It needs funding. We cannot have a world where people don’t understand the crisis they and future generations will have to deal with.
We need this in a way that is sustainable so that journalists can do their jobs without having fear of job cuts.
The wound needs to be staunched to the bleeding stops. A functioning democracy and informed society depends on it.
Article publié le lundi 4 novembre 2024
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