A full-time reporter. That is how Elvira Lobato, one of the most award-winning and prestigious journalists in Brazil with 39 years dedicated to print journalism, described herself. Even after deciding to retire from Folha de São Paulo in 2011, where she was a special reporter and worked for 27 years, her “destiny” to investigate would not allow her to leave the field. In February, Lobato published a series of reports on television concessions in the Amazon in partnership with independent news site Agência Publica.
While covering organized crime in Latin America, Mexico-based British journalist Ioan Grillo identified parallels in the mode of operation of the largest criminal organizations in the region – whether in Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City or Kingston, Jamaica.
While journalists in Ecuador who were part of the global journalistic investigation known as the Panama Papers are facing a “campaign of harassment” led by the country’s President Rafael Correa and his followers, in Peru and Panama, the most adverse reactions have come from the traditional media and civil society, respectively.
Convinced that investigative journalism reaches beyond local contexts, nonprofit organization Connectas, which is based in Bogotá, Colombia, launched a new project to promote the production and distribution of transnational investigative journalism.
The transnational investigative journalism series "Império das Cinzas" (“Empire of Ashes”), about illegal cigarette trafficking in South America, was announced winner of the Global Shining Light Award on Oct. 10.
Latin American journalists gathered in Colombia last week to commemorate Gabriel García Márquez’s impact on the profession and share how their reporting is fighting corruption in the region.
Latin American journalists now have a tool that allows them to discover the best published journalistic research and articles in the region. The tool is known in Spanish as the Banco de Investigaciones Periodísticas (BIPYS), a database of journalistic investigations created by the Press and Society Institute (IPYS for its acronym in Spanish), which has been open for public access since July 6 through a paid subscription.
Several female journalists in Trinidad and Tobago have been the targets of social media attacks in the past few months as a result of their investigations into suspicious behavior in the public administration. These attacks come months ahead of the general elections slated to take place in September.
Three days before the end of their crowdfunding campaign, Brazilian journalism nonprofit Pública, an investigative organization led by women, met its goal. The campaign “Ocupe A Pública”, launched on Jan. 21, aimed to collect $50,000 Brazilian reals (around US $18,000) to fund 10 stories with themes chosen by reader-collaborators who will also be involved with their production.
“Remember that journalism is a matter too serious to leave only to journalists.” This phrase captures the spirit of the new crowdfunding project from Pública of Brazil.
Investigative journalist Mark Bassant was forced to leave Trinidad and Tobago last week after receiving death threats, the International Press Institute (IPI) informed.
When journalists meet to talk about the future of the profession, the conversation often turns pessimistic: shrinking newsrooms and fewer spaces for in-depth reporting are some of the most common complaints. But there are some who see in this diagnosis of the crisis in traditional journalism a source of opportunities.