“Latin America and the Millennium Development Goals” Journalism Award Second Edition

LATIN AMERICA: IPS and UNDP Launch Second Journalism Prize on MDGs
By Diego Cevallos

MEXICO CITY, Nov 19 (IPS) - Next year will be a tough time for the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, which means it will be more than ever necessary to avoid backsliding in the efforts to reach the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and journalists have an important role to play in that task, UNDP regional director Rebeca Grynspan said Wednesday.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) director for Latin America and the Caribbean was speaking at the launch in Mexico City of the second "Latin America and the Millennium Development Goals" Journalism Award sponsored by the U.N. agency and the Inter Press Service (IPS) international news agency.

The prize, which "pays homage to journalists who help make utopia achievable," takes on special importance in this time of crisis, said Grynspan. It also urges reporters to come up with new ideas and proposals for coverage of issues and life stories linked to the MDGs, she added.

Journalists can and should focus on the relationship between the MDGs, adopted by the international community in 2000, and the impact of the current global financial crisis, which this region had no hand in causing but which will nonetheless affect it, said Grynspan.

A total of 466 articles from 19 Latin American and Caribbean countries, written in Spanish, Portuguese or English and published in print media in the region between Oct. 1, 2006 and Jun. 30, 2007, were submitted for the first edition of the UNDP/IPS prize.

The prize-winners, who received the award in an October 2007 ceremony in Mexico City, were from Brazil, Mexico and Uruguay.

The competition awards journalists for articles written on issues linked to the MDGs, a set of targets in the areas of health, education, gender, the environment and the fight against hunger and poverty that were agreed by the world’s governments in 2000, to be met by 2015.

The second edition will accept articles written for the print media or Internet web sites, and the number of submissions is expected to be even larger than in the first edition, said IPS regional director for Latin America, Joaquín Costanzo.

The first edition clearly demonstrated that it is possible to provide high-quality, attractive journalistic coverage on the MDGs and related issues, said Costanzo, who added that the aim of getting the MDGs into the media is "achievable and necessary."

At the presentation of the second edition of the prize, which was attended by 23 reporters from Mexican and international media outlets, as well as representatives of U.N. agencies, Grynspan urged governments not to let down their guard because a tough year lies ahead.

The MDGs are now even more relevant, because during a cycle of low economic growth, child malnutrition, maternal mortality and school drop-out rates increase, said the UNDP regional director.

It is these effects that turn short-term poverty into structural poverty in Latin America, because these aspects are permanent: we never recuperate what was lost in the case of a malnourished child or in the case of a mother who has died, she said.

According to estimates by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the proportion of people in this region living in poverty rose three percent this year, to a total of over 200 million, due to the rise in food and fuel prices, as well as the global financial crisis.

In the last six years, the region maintained average gross domestic product (GDP) growth of over three percent, for the first time in 40 years, ECLAC reported.

The U.N. agency also said the poverty rate was reduced in the region from 44 to 35 percent between 2003 and 2007. The estimated 190 million people living in poverty in the region a year ago was the smallest proportion since 1990.

But after projecting average GDP growth of four percent or more for 2009, in August, ECLAC now forecasts a growth rate of less than three percent.

Grynspan pointed out that it took the countries of Latin America 25 years to recover from the damages of the crisis of the 1980s, the so-called "lost decade," and that it was not until 2005 that growth picked up again thanks to factors like the rise in commodity prices, global economic growth, and fluid, cheap financing -- conditions that will not exist next year, she warned.

The book, "Crónicas urgentes - Una mirada colectiva a la realidad latinoamericana", containing last year’s winning articles and several IPS stories, was published this year in Spanish by the news agency and presented at the ceremony Wednesday. (END/2008)