Enlightener project
of the Astrakhan Regional Public Organization “Bonjour mass-media club”

“The Volga River and the Caspian Sea as seen by Astrakhan journalists"

Project’s motto: “Enlighten by learning. Influence by enlightening”

         "Bonjour mass-media club" together with the Administration of the Astrakhan region is now implementing the enlightener project "The Volga and the Caspian as seen by Astrakhan journalists" in order to make the community and local authorities more aware about the critical environmental situation in the Northern Caspian and its adjacent territories.

        The project has been approved by Caspian Environmental Programme and has received a grant of Global environmental facility, established by UN, as proved by the memorandum, signed on the 22^nd of December by "Bonjour's" president Alyona Gubanova and by a representative of the Department for working with UN projects.

        The project has three aims. First of all, to attract attention of people to the problems of preserving the unique nature of the Volga’s delta and the Northern Caspian by means of most effective way – through mass-media. Secondly, to promote discussions about ecology in press on a higher professional level, with a wide degree of publicity, courage and responsibility. Thirdly, to achieve efficiency of ecological journalism, to strengthen its influence on decision-makers.

        Our goal is to make ecological journalism a prestigious occupation and its outcome of great demand.  

         Nature conservation and environmental activities of the state have practically dissolved in economical activity recently, it has been on its service. The ecological issues in press, on television and radio have stopped being undependent and demandable ones. They come out on screen and in papers only in critical situations, which can be properly called emergencies. There are several reasons to that.

         First of all, ecological problems in Russia are not considered to be social. Then, journalist investigations of these difficult issues are laborious and are not appreciated in a proper way. And at last, editors consider them “hot” only when people die, big forest areas are burnt down or oil spills touch famous beaches. While investigating ecological problems, journalists come across with interests and conflicts of business, which makes collection and interpretation of the material difficult. Thus, it makes the editors reject issues, which are actual ones for the society. Join efforts of the journalist community are necessary in order to change the attitude towards ecological problems. On the Astrakhan level it can be done by public organization “Bonjour mass-media club”.

        In the context of the project a competition among the works of Astrakhan journalists, written during the year (from the 22^nd of March, 2004 to the 22^nd of March, 2005), is held. 

Regulation for the competition

“The Volga & the Caspian as seen by Astrakhan journalists”

            Astrakhan regional public organization “Mass Media Workers the “Bonjour” Club” in the cooperation with Astrakhan regional administration, with the support of the Caspian Ecological Program conducts the competition “The Volga and the Caspian as seen by Astrakhan journalists”.

          The goal of the competition is the full-scale public information on ecological problems of the Northern Caspian Sea and adjacent territories, improvement of ecological journalism, its prestige & influence.

      Only Astrakhan journalists are admitted to participation in the competition. Works, published in any mass-media (newspapers, (newspapers, magazines, radio, television, Internet editions) between March 22, 2004 and March 22, 2005, are accepted. The participants are free to choose the genre. Not more than 5 works can be accepted. The deadline for submitting the works is the 30^th of March 2005.  

  The application works will be published on the Russian Information Agency “Avers” web-site.     

       The competition jury will include the representatives of “Bonjour” Club and Astrakhan Regional administration, famous ecologists. Head of the jury will be the Governor of the Astrakhan  region Alexander Zhilkin.

          The awarding ceremony will take place on April 22, 2005.