By Clifford Akumu
Nairobi, Kenya: The Fifth African Conference of Science Journalists came to an end on Friday 27th May 2022, with a clarion call for journalists to embrace cross-border collaborative efforts in telling the African narratives.
The uptick of collaborative journalism projects across the continent has since changed the way African stories are being told.
“We look forward to more cross-border collaborations between journalists in telling the African science stories,” InfoNile Co-founder Annika McGinnis told journalists at the virtual meeting that brought together journalists, researchers, and communicators from across the continent.
MESHA Secretary Daniel Aghan, in his closing remarks, said, “As journalists, we must now learn to work with others if we are to grow professionally.”
“At Mesha, we would like to thank all the journalists who have endured the four days of intensive and insightful presentations on science issues. I hope each one of you will put into practice the knowledge in their books to help mentor the new generation of new science journalists,” said Bozo Jenje, MESHA Chairman.
The last day of the conference brought to the fore the importance of new techniques in storytelling. Ms McGinnis took journalists through the new important resources in telling the science stories, among them geo-journalism and Nilewell platforms.
“We are looking forward to collaborating with journalists across Africa to tell good stories,” she said.
Mr Jenje added, “With these new techniques such as geo-journalism, journalists will now be able to show facts where stories were done and how they are impacting on a particular area.”
Shemei Agabo, a Uganda-based documentary producer, narrated his frustrations with telling the science stories before collaborative efforts.
“I got frustrated with how science stories were told. I wanted to tell the climate change story from a local dialect,” he told the virtual meeting.
“Collaboration and networking is very important when telling stories,” added Mr Agabo.
Mr. Aghan further said MESHA has been chosen to host the 2025 IFAJ Annual Congress, which will bring together agriculture journalists from across the globe.
“We hope most of the journalists on this call will join us for this in-person meeting. We are willing to fund the journalists from other countries who have been collaborating with MESHA in various ways to attend the meeting,” said Mr. Aghan.
Mr. Jenje hailed the support from the conference funders and promised the meeting the organization was looking forward to an in-person conference next year.
“The topics were timely. We are looking forward to an in-person Sixth African Conference of Science Journalists. We thank our funders for their support,” he said.
MESHA Features.
