Till recent years, nations--developed and developing--had projected this issue in the realm of international politics, instead of cooperating jointly towards finding scientific solutions to the problem. Fortunately, the global outlook on the subject is changing for the better.

What is even more encouraging is that, apart from inter-governmental endeavours, several non-governmental bodies, including corporate organisations, are also throwing in their mite to preserve the planet from ecological disasters. The `EU-India Economic Cross-Cultural Scheme' is a step in this very direction.

The project aims to build a durable exchange of information on environmental issues between the participating countries. The scheme also involves a field-work oriented exchange programme for radio andtelevision journalists in these countries.

Mike Slater, director of The Communications Partnership, a media consultancy firm based in the UK, reveals that under the scheme, radio journalists chosen from India and the EU countries will receive training at a premier radio centre in Amsterdam. The Communications Partnership is associated as a partner firm in the `EU-India Economic Cross-Cultural Scheme'.

The exchange programme is supported by The Thomson Foundation, a charitable trust set up by Lord Thomson, a Canadian newspaper and television owner. The Foundation seeks to facilitate training programmes for journalists in new democracies, to create a free press in these countries.

"With the collapse of the Berlin Wall, a host of countries were freed from the clutches of communism. Journalists from Hungary, Poland and others are being trained under the various programmes of the Foundation on how to do reporting in a democracy," explains Slater.

"Of course, the Foundation's objectives for India are quitedifferent. In India, the requirement is for an advanced level of training in electronic journalism, in keeping with the technological advances in the world of media, say in documentary making, digital editing, investigative reporting, management of newsrooms, etc," says he.

The radio and television journalists, under the exchange scheme, will undergo short-duration training in documentary making. Thereafter, they will put together a documentary on an important environmental issue. For instance, "The EU radio journalists who come to India, will put together a half-hour radio documentary on certain common environmental concerns, which can be compared and contrasted in both the regions," says Slater.

He takes the example of an environmental initiative in Sholapur to highlight his point.

In the 1960s, a township sprung up here on land that was earmarked as a natural reserve. Today, the authorities in the town have tried to retrieve some of the green areas by creating small reserves amidst the glass andconcrete structures. These stretches of land are said to be housing rare plants and seeds. Slater says that initiatives like these would be of much interest in the European circles, and hence a radio or television documentary on such a subject will find a ready audience.

From India, two batches of six radio journalists and one batch of 12 television journalists will be selected for the programme. The Indian partners for the exchange scheme are Doordarshan, All India Radio and IntegriTV, a Delhi-based television company headed by Savyasaachi Jain.

"We did not talk of slots with radio and television companies as we did not want to part with the editorial control," Slater says.

The media consultant is confident that radio will re-emerge as an important medium, along with television. "Television is seductive. But radio commands a good reach in the country areas. In Western Europe, radio, after a phase of decline, has expanded. News presentation has become snappy. Besides, it does the job of informingpeople who don't read newspapers or follow TV news," says he.