Inspiration for your climate reporting
Local writer Leonie Joubert and The Outlier team scoop international prize
We’re encouraged and inspired by the stories highlighted in this year’s Covering Climate Now awards. One story struck us particularly deeply as it’s local and a highly satisfying read – the deep dive by South African writer Leonie Joubert and the team at The Outlier into the story on how Durban was devastated by, and is recovering from, the floods of April 2022.
The story is called “A Perfect Storm: Durban’s Floods Show How Coastal Cities Can Prepare for Resilient Futures.” Funded by the Earth Journalism Network, it’s an outstanding example of putting a human face to climate breakdown, integrating sound climate science, and outlining solutions that a crisis-weary population craves.
But for that story, we might never have heard the good news is that the local authorities in Ethekwini are working hard on sensible mitigation measures to prevent a repeat of the catastrophic floods.
All of our cities will need to do the same. Perhaps many are, only we seldom get to hear about it.
Integrating climate into weather reports
Another interesting award went to Audrey Cerdan of France Televisions, the French national broadcaster, which in March 2023 replaced its traditional weather report with a weather-climate report.
This gives all the usual temperature extremes and depicted where there would be rain and sunshine in cities and towns around the country. However, this came in the context of climate change: a row of blue and white digits at the bottom of the screen depicted, to eight decimal points, how much hotter France was at the time than a century ago. The number kept shifting, showing real-time changes.
The show was a hit, as viewer numbers rose, which Cerdan attributed partly to the fact that it included viewers’ questions about climate change, answered by a scientist.
Watch the video
Keen for more inspiration? Watch the Climate Change Now awards video on a page where you can also find synopses of and links to the winning stories, or read The Guardian’s synopsis, An antidote to despair (how we all need that).
Talking of solutions, FFSA is hard at work on forging solutions for a fossil-fuel free world through our many campaigns. One is a world with honest advertising about energy issues, and we’re awaiting for a verdict from the Advertising Regulatory Board on a greenwashing complaint we recently lodged against TotalEnergies. Watch this space for details.
Find the information you need, on deadline
Our Climate Reporting Guide, which we updated recently, contains a wealth of information and resources for journalists needing to report on climate and energy issues, or weave these into their stories. It’s a searchable document giving the latest climate facts and figures, explanations of the science, resources to consult, experts to contact and more. We welcome feedback; find an introduction to the guide here and the guide itself here.
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