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Afterword

The textbook "Environmental Problems in Mass Media" is written by Dr. Oleksandr Byelyakov, Associate Professor of the Department of Press at the Institute of Journalism at Kyiv National Taras Shevchenko University, Ukraine.

The first issue of the textbook was published in 2001 and had a broad resonance. It was also placed on the Internet, on the web site of the electronic library of the Institute of Journalism at Kyiv National Taras Shevchenko University at: http://journlib.univ.kiev.ua (please select "textbooks").

The second edition of the textbook has additions and changes. The author proposes the creation of an environmental story step by step. Readers working on 15 original steps. This way includes chapters on development of environmental journalism, advises for preparation of story, use of terminology and statistical data in it, and cooperation with scientists. Some parts of this book describe sources of environmental information, methods of information search, shortcomings in interpretation of scientific information, ethical aspects of work with environmental information, and environmental sources in Іnternet. To ensure the high clarity of materials, it is proposed to use the "Fog Index" and create better motivation in the text according to the needs of audiences.

New ideas for the story and its creation could be found in the chapters about thematic diversity and genre variety and feedback from audience. The second edition of the textbook also includes a new chapter on environmental public relations and advertising. Every chapter includes new tasks and other student's activities. The special chapter describes individual work with students and analyzes samples of students published stories.

The Institute of Journalism at Kyiv National Taras Shevchenko University has a course "Environmental Problems in Mass Media" since 1995. Other Ukrainian universities could introduce new courses or use this textbook for the needs of existing courses.

Future journalists see huge problems in access to environmental information and its understanding. Some of the problems could be successfully solved through journalists' environmental education and their active participation in decision-making process.

Ukrainian citizens still experience a lack of environmental information. This situation has some historical background. Soviet leaders called ecology a "bourgeois science". Only Perestroika was a first time for the public to create a more realistic vision of nature as a victim of communists' ideology. However, after the Chornobyl catastrophe in Ukraine, ecological data was among the state secrets. Ukrainian law has had limited possibilities for a long time to guarantee free access to environmental information. People don't often know the truth about existing environmental risks.

According to the directory "Who is Who in Ukrainian Mass-Media", only 12 journalists in Ukraine confirmed that they are interested in covering environmental issues. At the same time, sociologists from the Ukrainian brunch of Socis Gallup International state that the majority of Ukrainians are interested in environmental problems.

It is hard to believe, that in a country suffering from Chornobyl tragedy and post-soviet crisis, journalists ignore such important topic as environ-mental coverage. The main reason for this ignorance could be a necessity to have special knowledge about environment and the ability to use it in everyday journalistic practice. Ecologists and environmentalists also need to learn how to prepare and present environmental information to the public.

One possible way to present new knowledge for future and current environmental journalists is through preparation of textbooks and course syllabi, the other is through organisation of seminars and teaching with the help of published literature. These activities will increase the ranks of journalists that can professionally cover environmental issues, ecologists and environmentalists who could effectively cooperate with governmental, non-governmental organisations and mass media on a routine basis.

Dr. Byelyakov initiated and organized an Environmental Journalism Workshop, funded by the Civic Education Project and supported by IREX ProMedia in 2000. The workshop involved working environmental journalists and university instructors of journalism and focused on the issues of impartial coverage of environmental problems in Ukrainian press as well as effective training of environmental journalists at the university level.

Positive changes in environmental coverage started after the 4th Pan-European Conference of Environment Ministers Environment for Europe in Århus, Denmark, in 1998. The author took part in this conference. The main principles of public access to environmental information were declared in the Convention of the UN European Economic Commission on access to information, public participation and access to justice regarding environmentally important issues, which was signed in Århus. It came into force on October 30, 2001. Ukraine was the second country to ratify the Convention among countries that already did so. This legal document guarantees citizens the protection of their environmental rights. The conference also provided an opportunity to refocus the Environment for Europe process on the needs of the NIS.

The 5th Ministerial Conference Environment for Europe was held in Kyiv, Ukraine, on the 21st – 23rd May 2003. Its agenda included public involvement in decision-making on environmental issues at the international level and environmental education. In this context, the textbook is one of the practical steps to the implementation of the Environment for Europe process's principles in Ukrainian reality.

The textbook involves the author's international experience. Dr. Oleksandr Byelyakov studied at the Catholic University Eichstätt in Germany. He was a research scholar at the University of California at Berkeley. His one-year stay in the USA was made possible thanks to generous support of the Junior Faculty Development Program of the American Councils for International Education and the US Department of State.

Currently, there is an Environmental Journalism Program at the Graduate School of Journalism of the University of California at Berkeley. American universities have more than 30 courses in environmental journalism or communication being taught at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Dr. Oleksandr Byelyakov has studied Sustainable Environmental Management in Beahrs Environmental Leadership Program at the University of California, Berkeley. He also has certificates from the Scripps Howard Institute on the Environment at the Center for Environmental Journalism, University of Colorado at Bolder and Environmental Journalism Fellowship at National Tropical Botanical Garden, Kalaheo, Hawaii.

The author did an internship at the newspapers "Cultural Survival Voices" of the Cambridge-based NGO "Cultural Survival", USA; "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung", Frankfurt am Main, Germany; German national environmental NGO Jugend im Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland, Bonn, etc.

He worked at the all-Ukrainian newspapers "Robitnycha gaseta", "Zelenyj swit", "Echo Chornobylja" and as a freelance for international mass media. The author also has wide contacts with many environmental non-profit organisations.

Dr. Oleksandr Byelyakov had published three books: directory "Environmental Press of Ukraine", book "Mass Communication and Environmental Policy" and textbook "Environmental Problems in Mass Media." His main academic interests include interdisciplinary approach to solving of environmental problems.

The author would like to express his gratitude to the following scholars and journalists for their invaluable support and motivation:
• Prof. Dr. V. Risun; Dr. T. Prystupenko; Prof. Dr. Y. Yarmysh; Prof. Dr. V. Ivanov; Prof. Dr. G. Kryvosheja; Prof. Dr. M. Bohachevsky-Chomiak; M. Pereyma; Prof. Dr. N. Chernysh; Dr. I. Vyshenska; O. Osadcha – from Ukraine;
• Carolyn and Richard Beahrs; Dr. Robin Marsh; Prof. Dr. David Zilberman; Leslie Correll; Prof. Dr. Orville Schell; Jane Kay; Paul Rogers; Marla Cone; Prof. Dr. JoAnn Valenti; Prof. Dr. Paul Cox; Dr. Gaugau Tavana; Prof. Dr. Len Ackland; Prof. Dr. John Miller; Dr. Michael Frome; Prof. Dr. Sharon Friedman; Prof. Dr. Kenneth Friedman; Dr. Michael Nitz; Bob Nesson; Pia Maybury-Lewis; David Helvarg; Linnea Allison; Denise Ifkovic – from the USA.

Special thanks go to Serhiy Zaitsev from the Civic Education Project for his support of this project and the Kyiv Alumni Resource Center.

Thanks to the support of the Civic Education Project, Ukrainian universities and libraries can order this book free of charge. Your opinion about this textbook would be especially appreciated. Please send the author your comments or order copies by e-mail: seminar2003@inbox.ru