BAAG's activity update

BAAG have been tackling a number of M4D activities in recent weeks.  Here's a short summary:

Journalist training with VIKES
We've worked with Maiju at VIKES to finalise the training agenda, and also drafted a Guidelines document for the participants on the valuable relationship between journalists and NGOs.
We've also been considering British journalists as expert panelists.  Our first choice, Lyse Doucet, Chief International Correspondent of the BBC, was sadly unavailable during the necessary dates. We've subsequently spoken to 7 other accomplished journalists and are pleased to have secured Mark Doyle, who until last week was the International Development Correspondent for the BBC and is now starting his consulting career - we're his first assignment!  Mark brings a wealth of development journalism training, and is also very familiar with Nigeria which bodes well for the proposed study trip.

International Roundtable with Green Liberty
Along with other partners, BAAG has helped with development of the agenda and concept note.  We're now considering various British experts for a panelist position, and hope to confirm that soon.

M4D webpage
BAAG have designed and now launched the dedicated Media4Development page on our website.  You can see that via this link.

Public awareness event
We are finalising the agenda for our first M4D public awareness-raising event - a fun and informative evening celebrating the Afghan New Year (Nowruz).  Invitations have been sent to over 460 people - those familiar with the country and those who are not - and the event details can be found on this link. We've just taken delivery of our M4D banner - as you'll see in this photo!

National Roundtable
Now that we understand the agenda for the international roundtable, BAAG are working on the agenda and guest list for their complementary UK roundtable.  It will focus on how development assistance has supported Afghanistan, and will include participant(s) from Afghanistan.  More details to follow.

Ireland visit
In March we spent 2 days in Dublin, updating our Irish members on the M4D project, meeting with Irish Aid to talk about their continued support to Afghanistan and identifying possible venues for the photo-journalism contest exhibition later this year.

That's it for now - more to follow in the coming months.