|
| Press Club Equipment Grant Event Report |
|
|
| INTERNEWS MEDIA EQUIPMENT GRANT TO PRESS CLUBS IN QUAKE REGION |
| |
|
|
As part of its efforts to promote and strengthen access to humanitarian information in earthquake affected areas and strengthen media capacities, Internews Pakistan donated equipment to four press clubs and a media NGO of the affected areas in a ceremony at Muzaffarabad.
The four press clubs included Central Press Club (Muzaffarabad), Shuhad-a-e-Balakot Press Club (Balakot), Batagram Press Club (Batagram) and Bagh Press Club (Bagh) . Press for Peace, an NGO established by a group of local journalists, also received the equipment grant. |
|
|
| |
|
The US$5,000 (PKR 300,000) equipment includes desktop computers , fax machines and mini-tape recorders. Three office bearers from each of the beneficiary press clubs attended the ceremony and signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Internews Pakistan for the transfer of ownership of the equipment to the press clubs. Country Director Adnan Rehmat signed the MoU on behalf of Internews. The Internews Pakistan team comprised Media Law & Policy Advisor Matiullah Jan, Media Monitor Sajid Gondal and Admin Officer Zia Shams. |
|
| |
The equipment grant is consistent with the objectives of its Pakistan Emergency Information Project (PEIP) for the earthquake affected areas. The project is funded by UK's Department for International Development (DfID) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation . The ceremony was held on Thursday, June 22, 2006 at Neelam View Hotel, Muzaffarabad. |
|
| |
|
Press Club representatives thanked Internews Pakistan and its donors for assistance in building their technical capacities and assured that they w ould do their utmost to use the equipment for improvement of information access for the affected population of the earthquake-affected regions.
The media equipment donation is part of the US $550,000 (PKR 33.6 million) Pakistan Emergency Information Project designed to build and support the nascent independent radio media in the earthquake affected regions of the country – Pakistan-administered Kashmir and North West Frontier Province.
|
|
|
| |
The project addresses the reduced capacity of the local media community to provide reliable and relevant humanitarian information to affected populations following the devastating October 8, 2005 earthquake that killed upwards of 80,000 and displaced 3.5 million, and the communication disconnect between affected communities, the government, and private and international relief and recovery response. |
|
| |
|
Working with seven of eight non-commercial, private FM radio stations licensed by Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) under the Pakistan government's open media policy, Internews has, between November 2005 and June 2006 trained about 150 journalists in humanitarian radio journalism. Most are associated with the emergency radio stations and local press clubs. |
|
| |
|
Under the PEIP project a 12 member radio reporters team of Internews produced over 200 daily Urdu language radio programmes of one hour duration titled Jazba-e-Tameer (The Spirit of Reconstruction) that have gone on air from emergency radio stations.
Internews has already provided about US$60,000 (PKR 3.6 million) worth of broadcast production equipment to the emergency radio stations.
|
|
| |
To improve humanitarian information access of the affected populations Internews is in the process of free distributing about 10,000 radio sets, worth a total of about US$18 5,000 (PKR 11 million) among earthquake affected families of the region in tandem with the UNHCR and IOM . |
|
| |
|
|
|
| |
|
