Environmen reporting should center the human. Only this way will the media succeed in raising awareness of the Makukhivka landfill issue, said Suspilne Poltava journalsit Svitlana Mostepan during the Media Day organised by the Heorhiy Gongadze Prize in Poltava on 22 November, reports Nadia Kucher, the Institute of Mass Information representative in the oblast.
The landfill in Makukhivka village near Poltava has been in operation for over 60 years and has long been overfilled. The landfill creates a number of environmental problems for the region and the local population: fires often occur there, and the waste pollutes groundwater.
“The reporting on this landfill should center the people. Because it’s difficult to influence someone through big concepts such as ecology, etc… Unfortunately, this issue mostly affects the residents of Makukhivka and only worries Poltava when there’s a fire,” said Svitlana Mostepan.
Vitaliy Ulybin, CEO of the news outlets Poltavska Khvylia and Sil.Media, believes that the only way to solve the Makukhivka landfill problem is to make the issue political.
“The only way to solve this problem is to make it political. It should not be about political ambition, but entail political and legal accountability. Which is why we now have orders from environmental services as well as court rulings that are not being enforced. Accordingly, finding and holding the guilty parties accountable can help move this issue along,” said Vitaliy Ulybin during his speech at the panel discussion “Is there life after the Makukhivka landfill: how to discuss environmental problems and be heard?”
As reported earlier, IMI’s Poltava oblast representative Nadiya Kucher believes that regional media play a key role in the life of local communities and the shaping of the country’s information landscape and are the basis of the state’s media sustainability.