July 15, 2021
Public Interest Journalism fund to train Maori journalists
NZ On Air’s new Public Interest Journalism fund is playing catch up, with the largest grant going to a Maori and diverse journalism cadetship scheme.
Te Rito is the first large scale training scheme for Māori journalists in more than a decade, and it’s a collaboration between Māori Television, Newshub, NZME, Pacific Media Network and 11 other supporting media organisations.
It will get $2.4 million over two years to train and hire 25 new journalists.
New Zealand On Air head of journalism Raewyn Rasch says it’s been a long time coming.
"For many years Māori journalists have languished at the bottom of the pay scale and all sorts of things and suddenly they are the flavour of the month – everybody wants a Māori journalist so the demand is going through the roof," she says.
Other Māori organisations to be funded in the first round of the $55 million fund include Aotearoa Media Collective to deliver public interest journalism workshops for iwi radio staff, Awa FM to report news from the Whanganui Māori perspective in Whanganui dialect reo and English, the Rotorua Weekender to print a weekly bilingual section, and Radio Waatea to deliver a breakfast current affairs show five days a week.
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