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Allendale County reporter Elijah de Castro poses for a photo with Brazilian investigative journalist Eduardo Goulard, at the Society of Environmental Journalists conference in Philadelphia. De Castro represented rural communities like Barnwell and Allendale at the conference, and discussed how media can better represent and inform communities on environmental issues.
Elijah de Castro poses for a photo with Karla Mendes, an investigative reporter who covers local communities witnessing the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil.
A roundtable of investigative journalists discuss how environmental journalism can better represent the lived experiences of local and rural communities.
Uncontrollable populations of deer and wild pigs, changing growing seasons and high levels of “forever chemicals” in local waterways are several of the environmental issues Barnwell, Allendale and nearby communities face. Yet these issues, which affect the daily lives of residents in rural communities, often go unreported and unresolved.
Between April 3–6, The People-Sentinel’s Allendale County reporter Elijah de Castro, attended the Society of Environmental Journalists annual conference in Philadelphia. At the conference, de Castro met with other environmental journalists to discuss how media coverage can help communities confront environmental issues while avoiding despair amid the cascading effects of climate change.
“There’s often a disconnect when it comes to environmental journalism,” said Claire Carlson, a reporter at The Daily Yonder, a national news publication that covers rural America. Prioritizing members of local and rural communities, Carlson said, should be the priority of environmental journalism. “The expert [sources] in that [community] are going to be the ones who have lived in that environment for a very long time. Even if they don’t have the PhD or the credential that proves that.”
As average global temperatures reach levels never before experienced in history, the intensity of natural disasters is increasing; In 2023, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found that 28 natural disasters caused a billion or more dollars of damage were recorded in America, the highest ever. According to polling by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, 56% of Americans are either “concerned” or “alarmed” by climate change, an 18% increase since 2013.
Yet, despite the urgent need to address environmental issues on global, national and local levels, the Media and Climate Change Observatory finds that global media coverage of climate change fell by 4% in 2023. Concurrently, American voters want to see more coverage of climate change during the 2024 elections, according to Covering Climate Now, a global news collaboration working to better climate change coverage within news media.
“Being able to connect the story to the audience is critical from a climate crisis standpoint,” said Tevin Wooten, a Boston-based broadcast journalist who reported on the city’s transformation of its housing supply off of fossil fuels. Prioritizing the lived experience of local community members alongside solutions, Wooten said, is imperative for effective local environmental journalism.
As greenhouse gasses from burning fossil fuels continue to accelerate global heating, rural communities that are the least responsible for the issue will be more vulnerable to its effects, according to the United States National Climate Assessment. Additionally, rural communities also face environmental issues unique to the ecosystem and economy that they live in.
“Every global story is local,” said Karla Mendes, a Brazilian investigative journalist who reports on the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest. “In many cases, local stories are also global. At the end of the day, it’s all connected.”
While the number of local American newspapers declines, disinformation campaigns funded by the fossil fuel industry have targeted communities as reported by investigative news outlet DeSmog. However, telling stories of how local communities are responding to climate change and other environmental issues can help turn the tide, said Yessenia Funes, an environmental journalist who spoke at the conference.
“It’s really really important to dig into stories that are not just about community plight,” Funes said. “Find folks who are actively working on the solutions. We need to ask our sources, ‘What is powering you? What gives you hope? What environmental story do you want to read about your community?’”
The People-Sentinel’s Elijah de Castro has begun a fellowship with the Solutions Journalism Network, which will help him tell stories about how rural communities like Allendale and Barnwell are responding to climate change.
Elijah de Castro is a Report for America corps member who writes about rural communities like Allendale and Barnwell counties for The People-Sentinel. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep Elijah writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today.
