Cloud – KCOMNET

P-FIM as a production tool for journalists

kcomnet — Sat, 24 Jul 2021 04:59:43 +0000

When it comes to productions, creativity really matter, sometimes it won’t hurt to borrow a leaf.

P-FIM means People First Impact Method. It was created by Gerry McCarthy and Paul O’Hagan who are the Co-Developers and Directors of the exercise.

The P-FIM exercise engages the communities directly by listening to their issues. Just like any other interview done by a journalist, listening and reporting are principles which applies in this exercise. The big difference: with P-FIM there’s no room for interpretation; you report what is said. The skill of listening is wanted here. Ask yourself: When was the last time you listened to someone without interfering, interpreting their statements or judging them?

This activity is important in our day to day work. We serve the community through different mediums and Community Radio is one of them. Community Radios are mostly owned by the community to inform the residents on the happenings using the local language of that community.

Radio is the most powerful medium of communication, using P-FIM when generating our programs and productions will bring us closer to the community. Most of our community members do not understand how radio or any other media tool is working. It is our responsibility as journalists to explain it to them so that they do not feel left out in our programming. Our communities need to feel that they own the stations, they need their voices to be heard and their issues addressed in their radio.

Voicing their concerns through their statements is more important compared to interpreting what they could mean. Statements are very powerful and every producer or editor knows quite well what makes good soundbites in different productions.

Asking the communities to highlight those issues which are important to them and advocating for their priorities is more important than having huge development programs in our communities that residents are not interested in and won’t own because they don’t address their real concerns.

Using P-FIM in our productions will not only highlight issues in our communities but it will help journalists to look at different ways of doing a production. It is a skill that will make our productions powerful and it will have direct impact to the communities keeping in mind the media ethics and law.

Trainings on P-FIM will be conducted and through the Community Radios, we will produce different productions, with different approach. These productions include: Cameo, radio dramas, news items, radio shows, documentaries etc. People use different methods and skills in productions as it advances and as Heraclitus would say, “There’s nothing permanent, except change.”

VOICE standards to improve your farmer program

kcomnet — Thu, 24 Jun 2021 04:52:26 +0000

Radio is a great communication tool for African farmers. It reaches most of them. It can provide important and timely information in their own languages. And radio, (often coupled with mobile phones), can give farmers a powerful voice in development.

But radio is not always effective. In fact, farmer programs often fall far short.

– The voices of farmers are rarely heard.

– “Experts,” on the other hand, are featured and respected, whether they are helpful or not.

– Program hosts are disdainful of farmers, whom they see as much lower creatures than themselves.

– Important issues are ignored or avoided because they are complex, or sensitive, or require additional resources.

– Broadcasters are given no training, and are expected to produce effective programs with little or no guidance or support.

– And much farm broadcasting is very boring to listen to!

Too frequently, a radio station thinks that a farmer program is a slot in the schedule into which they can simply “dump” agricultural information, and hope that farmers will listen and use it. But a radio program is a distinct communications tool, with its own strengths and weaknesses, like a novel, or a comic strip, or a song. An effective farm radio program follows standards that exploit the strengths of radio.

As a farm broadcaster, you want your farmer program to be useful, interesting – even empowering, for farmers. And you want it to have a wide audience of both women and men farmers. To help you, we have pulled together “best practices” of farm broadcasters, and have grouped them in a way that will be easy for you to remember and use.

We call them the VOICE standards for effective farmer radio programming. There are five standards, and in English their key words spell out “VOICE.”

V – The program values small-scale farmers, both women and men. It respects farmers for their hard work producing nutritious food for their families and the markets, often in the face of major challenges. It reaches out to farmers to understand their situation, and is dedicated to supporting them in their farming work and in their efforts to improve rural life.

O – The program provides farmers with the opportunity to speak and be heard on all matters. It encourages small-scale farmers to name their concerns, discuss them, and organize to act on them. It holds to account those with a duty to hear farmers and serve their needs.

I – The program provides farmers with the information they need, when they need it. Farmers require specific information and they need it in time to act on it.

C – The program is consistent and convenient. It is broadcast at least weekly, at a time when women and men farmers can listen.

E – The program is entertaining and memorable. It appeals to the interests and tastes of a wide range of local farmers. Complicated material is presented in a way that helps farmers remember.

Taking Fact-Checking To Kakuma Refugee Camp

kcomnet — Mon, 24 May 2021 15:01:22 +0000

Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya has a population of over 147,000 refugees from 19 countries including South Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Burundi, Somalia, and the Democractic Republic of Congo. The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) states that the camp was established in 1992, along with the host community of Turkana, situated in the north-west region of the country.

The UNHCR in their latest global numbers released in June 2019, recorded that an unprecedented 70.8 million people around the world have been forced from their homes. This problem has added to the spread of misinformation in these communities that consist of people with various nationalities and beliefs. Kakuma refugee camp is no different.

In October 2019, Code for Africa (CfA) partnered with GIZ and KCOMNET in their UMOJA Radio for Peace project to train radio journalists from the Kakuma refugee camp, as well as from Turkana, Uganda and South Sudan. The project is focused on community radio actively engaging in conflict sensitive reporting in the pursuit of sustainable peace and development in Kenya.

This was one of many trainings by KCOMNET in their collective efforts for the development of community radio in Kenya. Each training session done across the country is a two-day event addressing fact-checking and content creation. CfA tackled fact-checking and verification while radio journalists Bande Edward, from Ratego radio, and Tebbi Otieno, from Mtaani radio, covered content creation.

Participants from the camp mentioned two instances of fake news:

During the country-wide Huduma number registration (National Integrated Identity Management System), different versions of misinformation were spread about the process, including that it was a satanic number received by the people. Peter Gatdeet, a pastor in the camp, said that because of that information some of his congregants decided to return home to Juba in fear of being indoctrinated into evil. Kanere news reflector, an independent news magazine produced by Ethiopian, Congolese, Ugandan, Rwandan, Somali, Sudanese and Kenyan journalists operating in Kakuma Refugee Camp, recorded some of these instances.
H.E President Uhuru Kenyata had to address the claims:

Leaders of different groups and nationalities in the camp falsely informed their members that another faction was planning to attack them, which resulted in the former attacking the latter group who had no ill intentions whatsoever. Such instances have happened often.

Also noted were clashes between the host community of Turkana and the refugees. The Kanere news reflector reported that, on July 10, armed conflict between Somali refugees and members of the host community resulted in at least three injuries, including that of a child.

During the training, participants learned what fake news is: this was defined as deliberate, targeted misinformation spread via traditional print and broadcast news media or online social media. They also learnt that these fell in the categories of Misinformation, which is false information shared with no intent to harm; Disinformation — false information knowingly shared to cause harm; and Malinformation, which is when genuine information is shared to cause harm, often by moving private information into the public sphere.

In addition, they were taught that the fake news trend is driven by propaganda, because different people have interests they want to push; by under-resourced journalism, which does not allow for fact-checking a story; and by desire for political influence (misinformation can be a powerful tool in a time as sensitive as an election), or profit (gain from advertisers or private gain if the perpetrators are paid to spread fake news).

To counter such messages the communicators that were gathered for the training were taught how to spot fake news:

What is the source of the information? Were they official channels or gossip?
What is the date the information was first shared? Old news is not always relevant in the current situation.
What are the supporting sources of the information? Are said sources credible?
Do you have any biases? Personal biases may cloud judgement.

They also learnt how to fact-check images, videos, social media and websites and were encouraged to address malinformation as soon as it arises.

At the end of the two-day training, the journalists from the camp as well as all the others present, were equipped to address and assuage situations brought about by the propagation of fake news. They also learnt to not be the ones repeating and spreading untruths, by double checking the information they receive and present in their jobs.

The verification training materials can be found at http://bit.ly/KakumaFCT

Code for Africa (CfA) is the continent’s largest federation of indigenous civic technology and open data laboratories with CfA labs in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda and a further five affiliate labs in Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Morocco and Sierra Leone and funded projects in a further 12 countries. CfA manages the $1m/year innovateAFRICA.fund and $500,000/year impactAFRICA.fund, as well as key digital democracy resources such as the openAFRICA.net data portal and the GotToVote.cc election toolkit. CfA primarily supports grassroots citizen organisations and the media to help liberate data and empower citizens, but also works with progressive government agencies to improve digital service delivery.

In addition to funding and technology support, CfA’s labs incubate a series of trendsetting initiatives including the PesaCheck fact-checking initiative in East Africa, the continental africanDRONE network, and the African Network of Centres for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR) that spearheaded Panama Papers probes across the continent. CfA is an initiative of the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ).