NGOs and the press

Brussels, 6 June. During the Peer to Peer exchange session on advocacy, Christine Coudour, from European Voice gave an interesting presentation on the paper's cooperation with NGOs.

She argued that NGOs are still quite sceptical when it comes to contacts with the press. She described how civil society organisations can raise awareness among European policy makers by using a newspaper for campaigning.

Emphasising that European Voice is distributed to all EU policy makers, 'advertisements' are an important tool to reach target groups. Nevertheless newspapers are profit-making enterprises and will not usually offer their services for free. Although she can help NGOs to find a perfect format to suit a campaign, NGOs need to raise funds to cover the costs.

After the session two participants shared their perspectives on working with the media:

Marta Pejda - Gruppa Zagrancia (Poland): Click To Play

Florent Sebban - Eurostep (Brussels): Click To Play

Story by Martin Behrens

Using information, knowledge sharing, and communication for more effective advocacy

On 6 June, participants explored how the Internet and other tools are being used to advocate changes in development policies and practices? Presenters included Florent Sebban (Eurostep), Agnès Philippart (Concord) and Christine Coudour of European Voice, and Cécile Crosset (Plan Belgique). Read all the stories ...

YouTube and advertising for more effective advocacy

Brussels, 6 June. During the peer to peer workshop on 'information, knowledge sharing and communication for more effective advocacy', we gained insights into new tools of lobbying and campaigning.

Christine Coudour from the European Voice shed light on how development NGOs could use advertisement in the newspaper to lobby for their purpose: "Advocacy advertising is another campaigning tool to be used in combination with other actions such as press conference, events, directs contacts. European Voice is an ideal print title to reach the target audience of key EU stakeholders and decision-makers who rely on the independence of the editorial. There are special discounts for development NGOs and extra services such support with the designing and positioning."

Cécile Crosset from Plan Belgique pointed out how her organisation lobbied for children's rights by using a "slam", a mix of poetry and song: "In the context of our annual Action Week, we created a slam about the 4 fundamental rights of the child (participation, protection, survival and development). This was broadcast on radio stations.

The spot is also available as a video clip on YouTube. We had a lot of feedback, especially from people who were moved by it and who wished to use it on their blogs. By copying the code from youtube, it's easy to republish it. See the video:



Story by Birthe Paul