When media cooperation works, society thrives. Here’s how
The collaboration between three major European media sources led to the creation of a multi-language platform, InfoMigrants, compiling objective and practical information for the refugees and migrants hoping to flee to Europe, supported by a strong social media presence, and funded by the European Union.
France Médias Monde (France 24, Radio France Internationale, Monte Carlo Doualiya), Deutsche Welle and ANSA decided to join their efforts to get an exhaustive approach about migrants and refugees, resulting in the launch of the refugees and migrants information platform, InfoMigrants. Sylvain Attal, Chief Editor for France 24, an entity of France Médias Monde is participating on a panel at the GEN Summit in Vienna, 21–23 June, to discuss the concerted efforts behind the project and, how cooperation in the media is instrumental as a fail-safe practice for journalists to support populations at risk.
Misinformation and the migrant crisis
The influx of migrants and refugees from the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Sub-Saharan Africa in Europe in the past couple of years set off a crisis as countries have been struggling to cope, thus creating a wedge in the European Union over how best to deal with resettling people. Some countries have been very vocal about their refusal to welcome refugees and migrants and, although the tide of deaths in the Mediterranean has slightly abated over the past few months, the populations setting off to find a haven on European soil are still misinformed as to what they can expect of asylum processes.
As the shocking picture of drowned Syrian boy Alan Kurdi shed a light on the full horror happening on the shores of Europe, the inception of the collaborative informative platform took form.
“At this sad time for Europe, this bold new project re-emphasises our public-service duty regarding the migrant crisis,” said Marie-Christine Saragosse, head of France Médias Monde. “Back in July 2015, when the world was shocked by the picture of Alan, the Syrian toddler washed ashore in Turkey, we realised that the tragedy of the migrant crisis was compounded by the tragedy of disinformation.”
Keen to debunk the false rumours spread by people traffickers, smugglers, social media and other dubious sources, the consortium of European power-house news organisations, launched InfoMigrants just a few weeks ago to report on the journeys and lives of migrants newly arrived in Europe.
France Médias Monde’s Marie-Christine Saragosse, Deutsche Welle’s Peter Limbourg and ANSA’s Giuseppe Cerbone, wrote in a joint statement: “ We were fully aware of the human tragedy that was unfolding and decided to combine our expertise and worldwide public-service mandates in order to provide migrant populations with trustworthy information. This cooperation among three leading European media to serve a European and worldwide cause was unprecedented and the European Commission promptly agreed to back us with funding.”
“At this sad time for Europe, this bold new project re-emphasises our public-service duty regarding the migrant crisis”
New organisations unite
The trilingual platform provides verified information to refugees and migrants in order to unveil the false stories some of them have reported falling prey to as they sought for an escape. The brunt of the migrants and refugees population targeted is from the Middle East, with a strong accent on Syria, Libya, and Yemen, but also Afghanistan and Pakistan, and Sub-Saharan Africa.
The three founding media organisations have established editorial teams from their newsrooms working as one from their respective countries, to create daily content for the InfoMigrants platform and feed its strong presence on social channels, a work started at the very beginning of the year.
“It’s a challenge to be building a website with three teams in three different countries, but we’re happy to face that,” said InfoMigrants Chief Editor Amara Makhoul. “It works quite well, and we’re finding that the dialogue is enriching our work and our production because we all have different visions of the crisis but also of the way we can deal with it as journalists. All our differences put together makes the dialogue and the discussions about work more constructive.”
The dedicated team of editors produces original reports and articles in French, English and Arabic for the site, also sharing articles previously published on the partners’ publications France 24, Deutsche Welle and ANSA. The team overviews the collaborative space on the website as well, presenting testimonies of the migrants themselves: stories of successful and failed integrations, portraits, interviews, factual digests, legal informations, and language tutorials from the RFI and Deutsche Welle’s websites. Finally, an informative section exclusively managed by a team from the European Union aims to round up the exhaustive content on the platform.
France 24’s collaborative journalism project The Observers lends a very helpful hand to the InfoMigrants project in tracking and dispelling rumours geared for migrants on social media. The use of Facebook has proven essential in reaching people in their country of origin and as they are migrating through mobile-friendly formats.
Deutsche Welle uses also InfoMigrants to put forward information on programs in Germany beneficial to refugees and migrants, such as the initiative “StartHilfe Plus” funded by the German government, which provides assistance for voluntary repatriation.
ANSA contributes essential reporting to the InfoMigrants platform through its multi-language service ANSAmed with its networks of correspondents and contributors around the Mediterranean, providing important testimonies from the main front of immigration in Europe, through the southern Europe and African channels.
Monthly reports on reach and usability for the migrant and refugee population in Europe are conducted by researchers from the Open University, based in the United Kingdom, ensuring that the mission InfoMigrants is attempting to fulfil is rightly calibrated for its intended target, and for the collaborative initiative to adjust accordingly.
Professor Gillespie aims to ensure that the work undertaken by the pan European collaboration balances “the need to address the dangers of illegal immigration and the imperative to protect refugees and asylum seekers.”
The editorial agenda of the platforms is ambitious, keeping at the forefront of its objectives to inform in a neutral way, giving people who are seeking a way out of countries in conflict, the information to make an informed choice, without bias.
ANSA’s deputy director Stefan Polli and Deutsche Welle’s programme director said: “The millions fleeing war, persecution and poverty don’t have reliable information. A specific priority is to target those who haven’t yet arrived on EU soil, so that they don’t depend on smugglers’ misleading instructions”
What’s next
Upgrades will improve the initiative this month, with the addition of several features to the website: users will be able to switch from one language to another seamlessly, sections will be added for News, Features, Personal Stories and Understanding Europe. The latter will seek to cover cultural specificities of European countries and cities for migrants to understand how to navigate customs, language, administrative procedures and practicalities of everyday life in their asylum country. WhatsApp is also set to be added in the next few days to the roster of social channels InfoMigrants uses to dispense information to asylum-seekers.
“Migrants have the habit of getting information on these social networks, so we have to be present where they are searching and looking for news,” said InfoMigrants Chief Editor Amara Makhoul. “We’re trying to be a voice other than the smugglers or other false information circulated on these networks.”
The impact of the initiative has yet to be fully measured; a few more weeks will be needed to see if InfoMigrants can meet its lofty goals of providing vital and objective information to migrants and refugees ahead, during or after their journey to Europe.
Sylvain Attal, Chief Editor of France 24 and Editorial Director of InfoMigrants for France Monde Médias, will go into more details about the InfoMigrants project and on the topic of collaboration between media organisations at the GEN Summit in Vienna, 21–23 June.
Monique Villa –Thomson Reuters Foundation
“Modern-day slavery is a growing business. The refugee crisis and the free movement of people across European borders have created a unique opportunity for traffickers to prey on vulnerable people. It is good to see financial institutions taking the lead in the fight against this global crime. They have a crucial role to play. They have access to financial data that can lead to the traffickers and provide crucial evidence needed to prosecute those responsible for this most shameful crime.” (2 May 2017, Irish Business Times)
Jim Kim – World Bank Group
We’re meeting at a time when we face overlapping crises, both natural and man made, all which add urgency to our mission: conflict; climate shocks; the worst refugee crisis since the second world war. (20 April 2017, The Guardian)
Mireille Girard – UNHCR
The refugee situation is not one country’s problem, it’s everyone’s problem, and everyone has to respond together. We see some xenophobia mounting a bit, though… it’s actually much less than in Europe. The levels of vulnerability of people have increased tremendously over the last two years. If they don’t pay bills, they don’t pay their rent, they accumulate debt — this is a cause of social tension. (3 April 2017, France 24)
Tai Nalon–Aos Fatos
The collaboration between media outlets is becoming a pillar of contemporary journalism at the same time as checking in real-time gains global traction. Joining these two phenomena is essential. (26 October 2016, Knight Center for Journalism)
