Context
A professional and resilient media including the press is vital to a well-functioning democra-cy. Self-regulation of the media, where the media is regulated by peers and guided by a code of ethics, is one of the ways to ensure journalism maintains high professionalism yet flexible enough to adapt to the changing media landscape.
UNESCO is a major development partner supporting Timor-Leste’s media infrastructure in particular through the strengthening of media self-regulation, community media and jour-nalism education.
Action
The three year long project “Strengthening Media Self-Regulatory Mechanisms in Timor-Leste” (2017-2020) is managed by UNESCO with the financial support from the Netherlands. The objective of the project is to strengthen self-regulatory mechanisms of the media in Ti-mor-Leste and in the long term to foster an enabling environment for a sustainable, free, independent, and professional media in the country.
The project will address various challenges facing self-regulatory mechanisms in the country through capacity building activities such as peer-to-peer training with international or re-gional experts, enhancing the knowledge of the Timor-Leste Press Council in the effective management and daily operation of a press council. It will also include the training of future Timor-Leste journalists and journalism students on the role of self-regulation including building their capacity to produce quality journalism.
Impact
The project will improve the sharing of good practices and experience with established re-gional and international press councils in a South-South and North-South modality. Also in-cluded in the project are awareness-raising activities on the role of self-regulatory mecha-nisms, dialogues on legal reform and importance of free, independent and professional me-dia through public symposiums, infographics, and animated videos.