Climate Communications Data Intelligence and Discourse Report, 2025

Maai is a groundbreaking climate narrative intelligence tool that will bring AI and data together with journalism to redefine how climate stories drive real-world impact.

Understanding how to craft climate narratives that genuinely drive change is more critical than ever. And as technology emerges that can help us understand this more than ever, how can we create an ethical, equitable tool to help journalists do just this? This is the question that led to the Maai Platform being conceived.

This report represents the foundational steps of making Maai a reality. Here, you can dive into the research behind Maai, and the findings of a proprietary study revealing how journalistic choices shape public perception and response to the climate crisis and what can be done to immediately impact that narrative.

Using a first-of-its-kind climate discourse analysis—revealing what angles and frames make climate narratives truly effective—this research is fed by a database of over 7 million stories, from 1968 to 2025, from over 35,000 news outlets.

The Maai Researcher and Maai Scores tools will act as a strategic partner for new media—brainstorming, optimising, and assisting in crafting stories that resonate to deepen potential impact.

The Maai team is a group of multidisciplinary data scientists, researchers and journalism experts. It consists of: Dr Henri-Count Evans (Data Scientist, Wits Centre for Journalism Research Associate and Maai Research Lead, Africa); Dr Samuel Olaniran (Data Scientist); Mr Johnson Sikhumbuzo Dlamini (Data Engineer); Mr Lucky Nhlanhla Sithole (NLP), Miss Temalangeni Minenhle Dlamini (Research Assistant, Engineer); Mr Sobantu Mpumelelo Dlamini ‍(Research Assistant); Dr Carmen Nicoara (climateXchange Impact Manager and Wits Centre for Journalism Research Associate); Mr Pete Trainor (AI Morals and Ethics, Human Focused Designer and Author); and Dr Dinesh Balliah (Director of the Wits Centre for Journalism). The Programme Director for climateXchange and Maai Team Lead is Ms Shereen Daver.

For more information on Maai, contact Shereen Daver: shereen@climatexc.org

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