Space Between: Can Climate Pay its Way?

What is the pathway to sustainable climate news products?‍

As news avoidance grows and competition for audience attention continues, climateXchange (cXc) hosted a recent live fireside chat gathering thought leaders from Asia, Europe and Africa. Our aim: to discuss what sustainability looks like for newsrooms, how climate journalism can be supported, and if climate news products can truly pay their own way in commercially competitive times.‍‍

Defining sustainability for newsrooms‍

In conversations with partners and in shaping our own cXc internal sustainability organisational strategy we consider the whole system, particularly the intersection of three key areas: digital transformation, operations and culture.

First of all, digital transformation has accelerated the conversation of what ’sustainability’ even means for newsrooms. Technology not only streamlines but enables specific task forces to improve short-term and long-term impact with respect to sustainability (for example, in data centre energy usage, AI and production). With this transformational work comes the responsibility of looking at the external media ecosystem, namely audience, business, politics, and critically, the internal newsroom systems where margin may be at odds with climate innovation and transformational investment: the very things that could be tools for future-proofing. 

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Operational change may be seen as easier for smaller, still-establishing newsrooms but it is equally as critical for larger legacy organisations. Consider that climate and sustainability impact all aspects of life and it becomes clear how fundamental this is to a whole newsroom ecosystem. Climate angles are in all beats, so different skills and access is needed for creators. This requires different types of proficiency development from capacity building, to restructuring, to new ways of working and producing stories.

Both tech and operations will impact the culture of any business, including a newsroom. Any shift in direction needs to be communicated well, understood and believed in for true sustainable development. Innovation and entrepreneurial skills that are fostered with an emphasis placed on building trust-based relationships can yield radical collaboration. Such a shift offers to empower revenue generating teams, asking them to contribute and create new climate product strategies over time.‍

To the panel: What does sustainability mean to their organisations and how do they mitigate their climate impact?

A Strong Foundation: Organisational groundwork must be done so the right access to resources across the system builds trust and efficiency. If organisations have a solid foundation then impact and change can be elevated. It becomes part of culture, where creative problem solving is second nature. It means people can work together to experiment with new revenue streams designed to flow through the organisation. 

Conscious Climate Journalism: Often journalists have to travel for the story and climate mitigation must be conducted on the go. Each newsroom needs to be asking how  journalism can be climate conscious. If this becomes a measure of impact, a part of organisational communication, and a way to build community, then momentum builds. By encouraging people to fundamentally understand what the organisational goal is and why it matters, everyone can work together to create climate mitigating solutions. 

Demystifying language: The nomenclature around climate and investment can be intimidating for news organisations, especially smaller teams, which can hinder development. There are many ways to focus on a few key things that will grow the business. Growing an understanding of the audience that wants your journalistic product will increase investor interest and also develop a wider understanding of how to run a long-term business that, from its outset, mitigates climate impact from the inside out. Our audience also voted on this and were split:

Thought Starter: How can lines of communication be opened to make climate mitigation part of the organisational dialogue?

Financial sustainability

With commercial pressures for margin, newsroom leaders are conflicted about where to invest, making newsroom audiences and incremental revenue from climate innovation a difficult priority. Climate journalism and investing in different innovations are directly linked to risk management and enabling teams to find additional sources of revenue over and above philanthropic support.

As cXc host knowledgeXchanges regionally, newsrooms are supported in expanding what ’financing’ could look like. This evolves viability and how to maximise climate impact. Some different approaches include:

• Commercial (Advertising, Sponsorships, Brand Partnerships) 
• Reader (Subscription, Membership) relevance building and engagement
• Transactional (Events, Ticket Sales, Branded Merchandise) 
• Syndication (Content, Format)
• Philanthropy (Philanthropic Connections, CSR Initiatives) 
• Venture Capital (VC) / Angel Investment / PE
• Crowdfunding 
• B2B subscription

To the panel: What does financial sustainability mean in the media today and how does your organisation achieve this?

‍Test & Learn: Financial sustainability is a mindset. It considers how to collaborate with everyone and looks at what is worth paying for. Newsrooms don’t have the silver bullet, so business models need to consider editorial products that are omni-channel. If products are multi-tiered for different types of impact this may require diverse collaboration partners, a deeper level of audience understanding and therefore a different approach.

Freedom of Press: Financial sustainability differs from region to region, country to country. Sometimes regulatory pressure is heavy, so it becomes about containment and protecting the freedom of the press. This is different from landscape to landscape and it cannot be taken for granted. Climate work can be easily undone and so the focus becomes about sustaining the momentum that has been created.  

Editorial Commitment:  If a newsroom has a strong values system and a clear mission then the editorial strategy differentiates you. It builds loyalty and trust which then enables news products to be valued. This gives financial sustainability and generates creative problem solving.

Audience, Audience, Audience: Financial sustainability means knowing your audience, understanding them and ultimately delivering content that resonates. Reader insight and knowledge underpins all content strategy. When this is combined with a strong editorial commitment, audiences will be organic content ambassadors, sharing what newsrooms write because it speaks to them in a way they understand and in a format they use. 

Thought Starter: How well do you know your audience? How can you foster a spirit of creative problem solving with programmatic climate content that goes across channels and formats?

Untapped opportunities 

‍‍A question fundamental to any discussion of editorial products relating to climate is, will there be a receptive audience landscape that will provide the engagement needed to make these ideas a success? Simply: is there a market here?

To the panel: Do you think climate editorial models are untapped financial opportunities?

Ultimately, yes. There is a huge opportunity in climate editorial models, but it all comes back to the audience.

What do newsrooms want to achieve with them, and what is the insight that will get us there? It is not about assuming, but about understanding.

News organisations must use this to develop strategies, anchoring themselves in strong editorial policy so the north star is set.

Financial sustainability and editorial independence require us to find the untapped futures streams in verified climate storytelling. Our audience voted and agreed (right). 

Thought Starter: Where are the gaps in your market that the organisation can fill? What climate information is wanted, what is needed now... and who has the money to buy it?

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From the panel: some areas where their organisations have developed sustainable climate products

• Niche projects with focused audiences, with a deep understanding of what resonates and impacts audiences builds reader trust and loyalty. (Eco-Business) 
• Diversified yet dedicated revenue streams, where each has different deliverables and clear KPIs, can open up new funding. It requires creative thinking and coverage. (Daily Maverick) ‍
• Incubation and focused growth strategies where organisations learn, develop and optimise quickly will open up new investment streams and opportunities. (MDIF)‍
• Always be in beta, ready to learn and act with intent. The audience and impact measures are strong indicators of what is resonating. Be clear in the goal and collaborate to get there. (IRPI)

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cXc sends a big thank you to our panel of thought leaders Kathryn Kotze, Daily Maverick; Wai Mun Ng, Eco-Business, Antonella Napolitano, Investigative Reporting Project Italy (IRPI); and Bilal Randeree, Media Development Investment Fund (MDIF).

Additionally cXc thank our regional partners  WITS University, WANIFRA & RFTW for their ongoing support in getting these conversations heard.

cXc Fireside Chats are part of our Space Between Program which seeks to bridge the climate gap between content creators and their audiences, between regions, and between business and academia for better, smarter climate coverage. Through conversation we explore diverse and different perspectives around climate journalism to inspire and ignite new life into the media ecosystem. This multi-perspective trans-boundary approach is reflected in our specially curated panels and the conversations we host in the program at large. 

Contact us if you are interested in joining our community or if you wish to be informed of upcoming events sign up to our newsletter here. 

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