News from Rio de Janeiro to Copenhagen Climate Summit
It was in 1992 when journalist Johanna Mannila,
51, wrote her first story on climate change. Leaders of the world were gathered in Rio de Janeiro to negotiate the so-called Climate Change Convention which led
later to the Kyoto Protocol.
By EEVA ERONEN
“There were no reactions to those news. They were
totally uninteresting,” she says now, 17 years later. Instead, people interested in environment were talking
about destruction of rain forests and erosion of biodiversity, Mannila explains
sitting at her desk in the city centre of Finland’s capital, Helsinki.
Mannila is one of the reporters who started to specialize in climate topics in Finnish
media in 1990s. Yet, writing about environment was not new to her; she had
written, for example, a lot of stories about acidification in Poland and former
Czechoslovakia a decade earlier.
Finnish national paper with great impact
Now Mannila is covering climate issues in the foreign
news desk of Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s only national daily. The paper does
not have any serious rivals so it has a great influence on the topics discussed
in Finnish breakfast tables.
Besides, she gets to pick the topics that other mediums frequently do not deal with.
It is a great responsibility, Mannila admits. “I have
learned to live with it. At some point it felt really stressing.”
Mannila is looking forward to new treaties and policies
At the moment Mannila is looking forward to the Copenhagen climate change summit where
the successor tothe Kyoto treaty should be agreed.
Mannila finds the summit interesting but considers it a challenging event to cover.
"A new treaty will be achieved", she believes. “There are
no other options.”
Mannila compares climate negotiations to the peace
talks of Middle East. “It’s a long process, but the predictions are much better.”
The challenging part of the event does not mean just
the contents of the stories but also practical stuff like moving around.
“Those meetings are just horrible. It is always such a
mess when one tries to hurry from place to place.”
Working for a good cause
Mannila says she is certainly working for a good cause, to prevent climate change.
She does not find it problematic although some people could consider it the
same as being biased.
“All the journalists are working for something
anyway”, she says. “Besides, we just tell what’s going on,” she says.
Everyone does not agree: Mannila is one of those
journalists who get rubbished on the web. “It goes like a water off a duck’s
back,” she says. “You can always blame media for something. It’s not different
in this case.”
Though, sometimes it can be tiring to deal with the
critics, she admits. “The worst cases are sceptical and retired emeritus
professors who need to prove they are still sharp,” Mannila laughs.
Increasing people's awareness is the main duty
Keeping so called ordinary people updated on climate topics is Mannila's main duty, she
says. “We need to explain why something happens and how it may affect everyday
life.”
A good example is the link between climate change
and the rising electricity prices. Aproper explanation is necessary
because electricity is an all time hot potato in Finland due to long and cold
winters.
Politicians, state and commercial agendas
Another important task is to explain what politicians
are doing, how global warming can be prevented and what is the role of new
technical solutions. On average Finns, who live in the promised land of Nokia,
are interested in the potential of new technologies.
One of Mannila’s main guidelines is to write the
stories like she was explaining something to her mother. “
She is a professor,
but though it was so hard for her to understand what is toxic waste and why she
can’t put batteries in the rubbish bin. That’s why I use a lot of energy on explaining
all the terms properly.”
Eeva Eronen is a Finnish journalist, who has covered
politics, economics and foreign news in national daily paper Helsingin Sanomat.
Besides, she's been working in communication units of development NGOs.
