Nearly twenty editors from across the South Asia -Asia Pacific region met in Colombo recently to take part in a two day conference organized by the Panos Institute in Sri Lanka (part of Panos South Asia) and United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

The objective of the discourse was to frame a better media strategy to deal with more effective coverage of hunger-related issues; thus minimizing hunger and poverty in the region.

The roundtable followed up a media research carried out by the Panos Institute in Sri Lanka to ascertain levels of coverage and importance given to issues of hunger by the English media across seven Asia Pacific countries.

Five English newspapers from the region had representation at the conference with India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Cambodia participating.

A comparative analysis was carried out to analyze which hunger-related  issues were given most coverage in the region’s media the most. The  media audit on Hunger was presented at the Editors’ roundtable. This helped to highlight the lack of focus in almost all Asia Pacific countries on poverty and hunger issues, in both urban and rural settings. 

The discussion at the Editors’ roundtable took up issues pertaining to Inequality and Hunger in the region. The main speakers were Omar Noman, Chief of Policies and Programmes, UNDP Asia Regional Centre, Colombo and other UNDP officials who are part of the UNDP hunger eradication campaign.

A paper on Media trends and Challenges was presented by UNDP Communications Officer, Manisha Mishra.

The Roundtable discussions that followed also looked at  issues pertaining to hunger in the region, like targeted interventions against hunger, international food policy architecture and media trends and challenges.

Among the points raised by the participants which included senior editors, news editors and mid-career journalists, was the lack of media focus  on soaring hunger levels among the urban poor, which is closely related to migration of the rural poor.

The deliberations were moderated by  Kunda Dixit, Editor, Nepali Times,  Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, TV journalist and Pamela Philipose, Director, Women’s Feature Service.

The discussions resulted in sharing ideas of how the media initiatives already taken to eradicate hunger, poverty and improve leadership capacities of the public could be used as common measures in the Asia Pacific region.

Lalitha Panicker, Assistant Editor,The Hindustan Times spoke of two highly popular campaigns carried out by The Times of India, India’s largest circulating newspaper, primarily as an effort to boost sales but which also contributed significantly towards social change.

She explained that while the paper achieved its primary objective with the two campaigns, Lead India and Teach India, it also created a trend in  media initiatives towards development that could be replicated by newspapers in other countries.

The Times of India's  Teach India campaign called upon educated Indians to help teach underprivileged children while the "Lead India" campaign provided an opportunity for youth of all strata of life to come forward to display their leadership abilities.

Taking this as a positive indicator of initiatives the media can bring out to facilitate social change, the roundtable affirmed the fact that media holds an important role in  eradicating inequality and changing the status quo of hunger in South Asia and the Pacific.

Another key thought that emerged from the discussion was emphasized by Kunda Dixit who said that the location was a primary message imparting factor when organising conferences that are held to initiate change in a country or a region.

Faizal Samath, the Business Editor of The Sunday Times pointed out that measures to involve  media for social change should include all media players such as sub-editors, photographers, junior and mid-career journalists.

Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, Senior Television presenter pointed out that media should invest in quality reporting.

As Pamela Philipose, Director, Women’s Feature Service in India pointed out,  media should learn the art of telling old stories in a new way and not only be obsessed with bad news.

It was agreed that positive stories was a great empowerment of change. As Nurul Kabir, the Editor- in- chief of The New Age in Bangladesh stated, " true journalism is when one avoids writing anything he is not convinced of and commits himself to the kind of journalism that changes mindset".

Editors pointed out in their concluding remarks that the event should be followed up to share the long lasting impact of the roundtable.