Collaborative Investigative Journalism - The Next Step

Wahyu Dhyatmika (Tempo, Indonesia)

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We know it is important, and we know how to do it, but how do we maintain a strong collaborative network that keep producing high quality investigative report?

https://www.investigative.earth/

https://www.oceansinc.earth/

https://www.beneaththesands.earth/

in one year time

Challenges

1. Maintaining the same level of commitment in the institutional level, beyond personal relationships that create the collaboration in the first place --this factor will affect the time and resources allocation for the collaborative project from each partner
2. Producing better story each time, developing from the first story and learning from past mistakes, so we can keep delivering the quality and network required by donors and partners.
3. Reaching more audience and getting more impact

It's a journey, and a process. It is not something you build for one story, or one project. . . . .

ERC Unique Values

We are a network of journalists and newsrooms mostly based in Asia, all dedicated to investigating environmental crimes collaboratively. Our collaborative approach to journalism means that all our content – stories, videos, photos, etc. – are free to be republished and adapted by any media organisation (under Creative Commons license BY-NC 4.0).

1. We don’t want to compete with our newsroom partners, but we want to complement their work and help them do more ambitious stories. �2. Each newsrooms partners are encouraged to adapt our work to fit local contexts, they don't have to publish all of the global angles, but instead focus on their local angles �3. We also give training and story grants, and host gatherings and mini conferences.

Lessons Learned

1. Build a strong core team with dedicated and passionate journalists
2. Keep delivering the benefit of the project to all newsrooms and journalists involved
3. Keep the work fun and enjoyable for all
4. Be totally honest and transparent, but professional and accountable at the same time
5. Be creative, in finding new partners, new stories ideas, new formats, new business model

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https://www.investigative.earth/

Karol Ilagan, Editor, Philippine

Alex Papachristou

Thank you!