The awards ceremony on Wednesday. — Photo courtesy of the VSF.

Anh Đức

HÀ NỘI — At a prestigious event held on March 29 in Hà Nội, 11 female journalists and groups of female-led journalists received awards for their outstanding work in environmental reporting.

The 'Pioneering Women Journalist for Environment' award ceremony recognised these women's remarkable contributions to journalism.

In addition to the awards, a workshop entitled 'Enhancing role of the press in reducing plastic waste pollution' was also held on the same day.

The seminar brought together around 90 guests from various backgrounds, including state management agencies in the environment, businesses, organisations, researchers, networks operating in the environment, journalists, and other stakeholders from press and media agencies.

The results of the 'Female journalists with collective impact for reducing plastic pollution and plastic waste' project were presented during the workshop. The best journalism works were recognised and shared.

The project started in April 2022 with the cooperation of the For Vietnamese Stature Foundation (VSF), International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Vietnam Business Alliance for the Environment (VB4E), Institute of Strategy and Policy on Natural Resources and Environment, Ministry of Natural Resources & Environment and TH Group with the sponsorship of Earth Journalism Network (EJN) and Tetra Pak Vietnam.

The project looks to combat plastic pollution in Việt Nam. Along with that, many female journalists have not had the opportunity to access information and participate equally in the field of environmental investigation.

The project's main objective is to improve the capacity, participation and leadership of female journalists (especially young journalists) in investigating and reporting on plastic pollution and waste.

At the same time, promoting cooperation between stakeholders such as government agencies, businesses, social organisations, experts, environmental researchers/activists, and press and media agencies in reducing plastic waste and pollution.

Plastic waste pollution (PWP) is one of the most serious and urgent environmental problems on a global scale.

According to the report identifying plastic pollution hotspots in Vietnam published by IUCN, United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and Life Cycle Initiative in cooperation with EA, Quantis, in 2018, Vietnam had 453 kilotonnes of plastic waste leaking into the ocean, equivalent to a leak of 4.7 kg/per person annually.

With just one search on the internet on plastic waste pollution in Việt Nam, up to 1.3 million news/article/reportage results are found within 0.43 seconds.

This figure shows that the amount of media information on plastic waste pollution is large and easily accessible.

However, it is still inadequate to address the problem of plastic waste pollution in Vietnam, so the impact on awareness and changes in the behaviour of a part of the community is still limited.

"With the support of the project, in 2022, I have done many topics related to this issue, especially the article on the consequences of ocean plastic pollution in Pearl Island - Phú Quốc in the context of global climate change," said Đỗ Thuỳ Trang, a journalist with Việt Nam Law & Legal Forum Magazine. "I think the network is a great inspiration for female journalists to be more interested in environmental protection issues, especially topics on plastic pollution."

"Besides summarising the results achieved by the project, we hope that the contributed ideas and effective solutions in plastic waste communication will open up many topics of exploitation for journalists," said Trần Thị Như Trang, Director of the VSF. "From there, communication for the environment would be made more effective, gradually changing people's awareness and forming habits of sustainable development." — VNS