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Media urged to take leading role in poverty reduction
2006-03-02 09:13:08
By Issa Yussuf, Zanzibar
The media was yesterday hailed as an integral component of the poverty reduction strategy.
However, a media forum was cautioned that this was only possible if members of the Fourth Estate took their responsibility seriously.
The journalists were attending a four-day workshop on poverty reduction in Zanzibar.
The participants heard from moderators that media personnel were key partners in mobilising the public to support government initiatives on poverty reduction.
’The linkage between government poverty reduction policies, economic and trade reforms, and the public is the media,’ said workshop facilitator Anthony Ngaiza, from the Media Council of Tanzania (MCT).
He told the journalists that government strategies on poverty reduction should be known to the public, a role he noted could only be done by the media.
If the news dissemination is done perfectly, Ngaiza was optimistic that the war against poverty could be people driven and therefore won.
Ngaiza was emphatic that government plans and initiatives on poverty reduction cannot succeed without the support of the media.
’Research is the systematic investigation of a particular subject, Journalist, can make research to discover new ideas which can help the poverty reduction plan,’ said Slaus Mwisomba, an expert in poverty reduction.
Zanzibar Poverty Reduction Programme (ZPRP), launched in May 2002, aims at reducing poverty.
It gives priority to agriculture, fisheries and forestry, education, health, water, industry, good governance, infrastructures and cross cutting issues of Gender, Environment and HIV/AIDS.
The workshop was organised by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs (MOFEA) with the objective of building the capacity of journalists to understand and comprehend issuesregarding poverty reduction.
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