"In February this year, secretary-general of the United Nations António Guterres said that climate disruption, pollution, and accelerated loss of biodiversity were the critical elements that make up what he called the 'defining issue of our time'.
In Brazil – home to the Amazon rainforest, the Pantanal wetlands, and diverse species of flora and fauna – environmental journalism is not a new beat. But it is a beat that has had to evolve rapidly in the past few years: first in response to global environmental crises unfolding on our own doorstep, and now in response to a government that has rejected science in favour of policies that protect unsustainable commerce.
During my time at the Reuters Institute, I interviewed eight leading environmental journalists in Brazil, as well as Visiting Fellow Wolfgang Blau, about how we should be responding to the climate crisis. The full result can be find in a paper you can download here. In summary, they mentioned three fundamental questions newsrooms should ask themselves about environmental journalism: who should tell this story? What should they be expected to know in order to tell the story accurately? And how should the story be told?"
