MEDIA
NEW BOOK CHALLENGES PACIFIC DONOR TRAINING CULTURE

A new book is being published in February 2005 that challenges the South Pacific's culture of short course training funded by international donors.

Profile: The South Pacific round (The Dominion Post, 12 March 2005)

Review: South Pacific Media: Dilemmas and Solutions (Scoop, 25 February 2005)

Review: Mekim Nius: South Pacific Media, Politics and Education (AsiaPacific MediaEducator, No 15, pp 232-233)

Review: A wake-up call for Pacific journalism (Pacific Islands Report, 13 January 2005)

More info on David Robie's booklinks page

Launch of Mekim Nius in New Zealand

New book challenges 'captive' media aid (AUT)

Radio Australia's Pacific Beat interview

New survey puts Pacific media training, pay under spotlight

Feedback to the Toktok page

A new book is being published next month that challenges the South Pacific's culture of short course training funded by international donors.

The book, Mekim Nius: South Pacific Media, Politics and Education, questions the aid gravy train and makes a strong case for journalism education and training at the region's universities. It is being launched at the Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference in Suva, Fiji

Author David Robie, Auckland University of Technology's diversity and publications coordinator, says the region's media industry has become the captive of training donor agencies. He says the university-based journalism schools have the capacity to develop an independent and focused regional industry media training strategy.

Dr Robie, who headed two of the region's journalism schools for most of the past decade (University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific), says New Zealand has played a crucial role in developing media education in the Pacific.

From the founding of the region's first journalism school with New Zealand aid at UPNG in 1975, Mekim Nius traces three decades of history of South Pacific media education.

The author also examines the impact of the region's politics on the media in the two major news countries, Fiji and Papua New Guinea - from the Bougainville conflict and Sandline mercenary affair to Fiji's coups.

Dr Robie interviewed 57 Pacific journalists, educators and media policy makers and conducted two newsroom surveys in Fiji and PNG.

Mekim Nius will be launched at the JEA conference in Suva in December.

It can be ordered from the USP Book Centre: info@uspbookcentre.com
Price: US$20
http://uspbookcentre.com/store/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=UBC&Product_Code=ISBN-9820105846&Category_Code=02NR
New Zealand release: South Pacific Books, price: NZ$49.95
sales@southpacificbooks.co.nz
Further information from David Robie: david.robie@aut.ac.nz

Pictured: Post-Courier then Fiji Times publisher Tony Yianni, one of the Pacific's innovative executives (an image of the many media people featured in the book).