What to Know If You Are Considering a Career in Environmental Journalism

With the consequences of climate change beginning to rear their ugly heads, environmental journalism is an incredibly topical and active field of journalism at present. The climate crisis—one of the most intersectional and complicated topics of our modern world—has a lot of areas that a journalist can focus on.

While journalists have the option of covering climate disasters themselves, they could also consider tracking government corruption and environmental crime as it pertains to the ongoing effects of climate change. The study of how organized crime is contributing to systemic deforestation of the rainforest is another pertinent subject—truly, look for specificity under the larger umbrella of the climate crisis and you will find it. 

Getting started as an environmental journalist can be intimidating when there are so many ways to cover this mammoth topic. So how can journalists find footholds to know where to get started?

One comforting thing about the climate crisis, says environmental journalist and IJNet Chinese Editor Crystal Chow, is that there is only one “side” to take—therefore, journalists don’t need to be worried about reporting without a point of view. 

“I'm not saying we should go and become activists ourselves, but I think we should be reporting the issue from the lens of justice,” she explained, adding:

“I think we should highlight [climate change’s] impact, highlight what has not been done, showcase some of the potential solutions, and make our stories relatable to people.”

To do that, it is essential for journalists interested in reporting on climate change to thoroughly research the science behind it. Scientific evidence is not a matter of opinion and can stand by itself when constructing an argument for the story you’re trying to write. However, journalists need to be able to tell a story, not write a report. “We need to make people understand what we are writing about, touching their minds and hearts and their feelings. In this way, we can [influence] the impact that we want or hope to happen somehow,” said Mais Katt, an investigative journalist who is currently the Middle East Editor for the Environmental Investigative Forum.

The science of climate change and why we are at the point we are now plays out perfectly alongside world events, government decisions, environmental crimes, among other human errors. And the human cost will be great. 

“It's very clear that [climate change] is the most important cross-border topic that we can all work on together,” Katt said. “If we have that in our mind as an organization, as the newsrooms, and also individual freelancers, then we can absolutely do something about it.”

Environmental journalism also needs to be collaborative—across topics; across race, gender, and sexual identities; across nationalities; and across the globe. For example, though most of the world’s climate reporting is generated in the Northern Hemisphere, the Southern Hemisphere has experienced the most serious and long-lasting effects from climate change thus far. This disparity led to the establishment of the Global South Climate Database, in an effort to inspire journalists from the Southern Hemisphere to participate in more discussions around climate change. 

Overall, the discussion about what needs coverage and the best way in which to do it in environmental journalism is ongoing. As climate change’s possible consequences continue to evolve, so will the methods in which journalists need to engage with climate reporting.