NGOs seek media help with environment campaign

NGOs seek media help with environment campaign

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Forum for Environment (Walhi) has
called on the media to help non-governmental organizations'
(NGOs) campaign for sustainable development.

Walhi executive director Emmy Hafild told The Jakarta Post
yesterday that the mass media is the most effective tool to
stimulate public debates about the sustainability of Indonesian
development and to invite suggestions for improvements.

"The media will be able to effectively build general consensus
on sustainable development. These debates, however, should be
conducted free from pressures from any groups in society," she
said during a break in a seminar on the relation between the mass
media and NGOs yesterday.

She acknowledged that the term "sustainable development" for
the economic, social and environment sectors is not an easy
concept to implement. Very often, society has to sacrifice one
sector in order to develop the other sectors, she pointed out,

"Many times...people put economic development before
environment preservation," Emmy said, adding that the cost of
such an approach is usually great.

Most of the time, poor people, especially women and children,
become victims of badly planned development. "If society has to
sacrifice certain (sectors) for the sake of the others, then it
should be declared openly," Emmy said.

She cited as an example the plan to establish parks in the
city. "The government shouldn't just appropriate land without
providing adequate compensation to the land owners," she said.

The one-day discussion, titled "Developing Better Media-NGOs
Relations to Disseminate Sustainable Development Approach", was
organized by Walhi and Inter Press Service.

Among the speakers were Kunda Dixit, Inter Press Service's
director for Asia, and Nasir Tamara, deputy chief editor of
Republika daily.

Emmy said that NGOs, as one of the proponents of sustainable
development, must work hand in hand with the mass media. For
their campaign to succeed, however, the media should dig deeper
into stories.

"The public may be stimulated to debate and question the
ongoing development practices by in-depth stories and features
that include the opinion of many sources over a long period," she
said. "It's this kind of reporting that we find is still lacking
in our mass media."

She noticed the relationship between media and NGOs has never
been better. The NGOs realize they need the mass media to
articulate their mission and communicate their aims to
politicians and the government. The media, on the other hand,
need NGOs as news sources.

At present, she said, NGO activists and journalists have
developed a close, unique friendship and solidarity, mostly
because the two face similar risks in their activities.

Among the risks she mentioned were being branded subversive or
dissidents by the power holders.

WALHI is a forum of 267 NGOs from all over Indonesia.(31)