UN Women, IOM and partners organized media training on gender-responsive reporting on migration 

UN Women Ethiopia Country Office in partnership with the International Organization for Migration (IOM) Ethiopia, the National Partnership Coalition under the Ministry of Justice and the Global Migration Media Academy co-organized the two-day media training on gender-responsive reporting on migration for over twenty participants including journalists, editors, and media representatives. The training, held in Addis Ababa from 7 - 8 December 2023, aimed to strengthen the participants’ skills and knowledge on gender-responsive reporting. 

Led by Ms. Sandra Ruiz Moriana from the Global Migration Media Academy, the training included sessions on creating understanding about global migration and gender, migration governance in Ethiopia, investigative journalism, introduction to migration correlated glossary, shaping narratives on migration, approaches on gender responsive reporting including editorial writing and interviewing migrant women. The panel discussion on shaping narrative towards gender-responsive reporting among migrant women and journalists as well as the sessions on ethical reporting and on the importance of self-care as media practitioners for effective reporting were instrumental to the participants.

According to Ms. Tinsae Gemechu, the news editor at the Ethiopian News Agency, the knowledge she gained from the training is a turning point in correcting the widely used wrong terminologies of migration into appropriate usage. The training also provided the opportunity to change her attitude from negatively perceiving migration to a positive one, “Before the training, I was not aware of the proper terminologies to use in reporting migration related news, and I feel I have been misleading my audience and readers.  In addition, I used not to view migration from its positive angle. Now, I am well equipped and motivated to learn more about the issue and reach out to the public including by reporting success stories on returnees as well as by influencing my colleagues to positively impact migration narrative and change attitudes.”

For Mr. Benias Abiy of the Ethiopian Media Authority, the training motivated him to be more ethical and change his focus area into investigative journalism. “It is my first time to take a training on media in relation to migration. I gained a deeper knowledge especially from the ethical journalism and investigative journalism sessions. I am interested to shift my focus into investigative journalism and to contribute on making migration safer.”

On behalf of UN Women and IOM, Mr. Schadrack Dusabe, Deputy Country Representative for UN Women Ethiopia, in his closing remarks stressed on the prominent role that the media professionals can play in making migration safe for women and others.

“UN Women and our partner IOM are grateful about the role that the  media  professionals are playing on our common  endeavours like safe migration for women and others,” he said.

“Now you are equipped with the right terminologies and approaches. As far as making migration safe, we can count on you on the provision of adequate and timely information including enforcing accountability and to make migration safe to all, particularly for women and girls. From UN side, we not only recognize you as media professionals. Most importantly, you are our partners since we all commit to work towards safer migration for women and girls.”

UN Women Ethiopia is implementing the Making Migration Safe for Women (MMS) project funded by Federal Government of Germany from 2023 - 2025 to ensure that migration is safe and orderly for women migrating from, into and through Ethiopia and that international norms and standards for protecting and promoting migrant women’s rights are strengthened.

The media training on gender-responsive reporting on migration was held under the MMS project.