Environmental Journalism in South Eastern Europe

The Croatian Environmental Press Centre (CEPC) was founded as an independent, non-profit and non-governmental organisation of environmental journalists and experts. The foundation of CEPC was a joint effort by a group of environmental journalists in Croatia, the environmental NGO Osjecki Zeleni and the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe. The centre emerged from the project Regional Environmental Press Centre for South Eastern Europe (REPC), which ran from 2000 to 2003 with funding from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands as part of the Regional Environmental Reconstruction Programme for South Eastern Europe (REReP).

CEPC's mission is to develop environmental journalism in Croatia as a crucial part of objective reporting on the environment and raising environmental awareness. The centre shares the regional goals of the REPC network.

On November 21, 2004, Verica Sikora was elected as CEPC president by the organisation's Constitutional Assembly. Sikora, a seasoned environmental journalist from the Croatian Information Agency (HINA), has twenty years of reporting experience, especially on the devastation of protected areas. CEPC's Administration Board consists of a state nature protection inspector and environmental activists and journalists.

co-organising and participating in the workshop Environmental Journalism (in cooperation with the NGO Osjecki zeleni);
cooperation and exchange of information with journalists and NGOs from Serbia and Montenegro, and the signing of the Declaration for Protection of the Danube River; and
objective and timely news coverage of eco-accidents and incidents in Croatia like the oil spill in the Lonjsko polje nature park, the massacre of 22 Eurasian griffons at the protected reserve on Cres Island, the illegal stone quarry in the Papuk nature park, and devastation of the fish hatchery in Kopacki rit nature park and the Danube River.

These news items were published through mass media and through independent environmental media via the Alert website.

In 2005 CEPC will expand its efforts to gather more journalists from Croatia and to connect them with colleagues in the SEE region. CEPC plans to launch a website with relevant materials for journalists.

As the CEPC is a result of joint efforts of Osjecki zeleni staff and journalists involved in the project supported by the Ministry of Environmental Protection of Croatia, the CEPC will continue to cooperate with Osjecki zeleni by organising a workshop in Zagreb.

Contact CEPC
Verica Sikora, president
Ljiljanka Mitos, deputy
D. Neumana 2
31000 Osijek
Croatia
Tel: (385-31) 203-600
E-mail: centrala@zeleni.hr