Journalists specialize in Environmental issues
Santo Domingo. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through its Environmental Protection Program, in coordination with the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, carried out the graduation ceremony for journalists participating in the International Diploma in Environmental Journalism, which 34 journalists from major media outlets in the country participated.
The aim of this course was to reinforce the level of knowledge on issues related to environmental issues to journalists participating in it, in order to strengthen, in turn, national capacities related to environmental protection. The achievement of this objective was based on the development of essential contents related to topics such as the National System of Protected Areas, System of Environmental Permits, biodiversity, water quality, air quality, watersheds, cleaner production, environmental laws and municipal environmental management.
The Environmental Protection Program is executed by The Nature Conservancy and INTEC with the auspices of USAID and seeks to strengthen national capacities to enforce Dominican environmental legislation, as well as to create awareness at the national level regarding the need to develop strategies of adaptation to climate change. For the development of this diploma, we counted with the collaboration of the Global Democracy and Development Foundation (FUNGLODE).
The Diploma was attended by 18 facilitators, five of them foreigners: Professor Bienvenido León from the University of Navarra, in Spain; Gandhi Montoya, Communications Coordinator of the Central American Commission for Environment and Development (CCAD); Rick Rodriguez and Jason Manning of the Arizona State University and the expert in Environmental Matters, the Italian, Alfredo Somoza.
Within the framework of the graduation ceremony of the journalists participating in the International Diploma in Environmental Journalism, the Dominican Network of Environmental Journalists was launched, whose objective is to promote integration, exchange and cooperation among Dominican environmental journalists, in order to strengthen their capacity for action when addressing issues related to the environment, as well as promoting the academic specialization of its members, the Dominican Network of Environmental Journalists was launched.
Other objectives of the Network are: to achieve an interrelation among journalists in the environmental area that has as a framework the exchange of information related to the environment and the impact it receives as a result of human activity in the Dominican Republic, defend freedom in the professional practice of the journalist specializing in environmental information, facilitating dialogue and access to information sources, organizing various training activities that contribute to the growing training of journalists in order to promote environmental debate and professional training and favoring the meeting with professionals, associations or other organizations from all areas, both national and international in order to raise the level of knowledge of the members of the Network.