"According to this report the media in low-income countries is too often left aside as a serious player in the fight against poverty. ‘It’s time that those active in poverty reduction realise the media is a public good and in a prime position to monitor whether poverty reduction is taking place.
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’ says the co-author Jon Barnes. The report assesses the media’s potential to scrutinise the progress of plans to tackle poverty including Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs). At the same time, based on findings from six countries in Africa and South Asia, this publication analyses serious political, commercial and professional obstacles to stronger media coverage on poverty reduction. Therefore, it highlights the importance of policy actors needing not only to recognise media potential and strengthen engagement with individual journalists, but also needing to support the media sector as a whole more effectively." (CAMECO Update 2-2008)
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"Draws together thinking and analysis that covers the breadth and depth of the media development landscape. The opening section, 'Why Media Matters: Global Perspectives' gathers the work of several thought leaders on major trends that cut across both the communications and development policy arenas;
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this is followed by an examination of the current debate that is engaging researchers, development professionals and media assistance experts alike, namely 'How Media Matters: Measuring its Impact'. The third section, 'Challenges in Media Matters: Practitioner Experiences' presents a range of regional and sectoral case studies, and the final section forms a guide to current information sources and studies of the field of media support, in 'Mapping the Sector - Literature, Surveys and Resources'. Media matters has four key aims: 1 To help development policy makers and practitioners understand the relevance of vibrant, independent media systems to their wider goals; 2 To highlight work on the evidence of the relationship between media, communications and the development agenda; 3 To flag key global and regional trends and opportunities in media assistance; 4 To map the media assistance sector, its growing body of literature, and the emerging international research partnerships that will help define its priorities to 2015." (Overview + executive summary)
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