International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF)
Wikis > International Women’s Media Foundation (IWMF)
Founded in 1990, the International Women’s Media Foundation is a vibrant global network dedicated to strengthening the role of women in the news worldwide as means to increase freedom of speech throughout the different media.
Strategies
- Building a Vibrant Network: A network of women in the media is at the core of the IWMF’s work. The IWMF network enables women in the news to join together in new ways to share ideas, resources, strategies and career advices.
- Cultivating Effective Leaders: Offering innovative training to women in the news media, The IWMF provides them with the skills they need to succeed in their career and become leaders in their newsrooms.
- Pioneering Change: The IWMF has a track record of developing innovative training that engages journalists in reporting on global issues that improves lives and creating opportunities for women in the news media to grow and expand their careers.
- Honoring Courage: The IWMF advocates for women journalists worldwide and calls attention to their bravery. Each year, the IWMF highlights the courage required to report the news in many parts of the world with the Courage in Journalism and Lifetime Achievement Awards.
Research and Activities
- The IWMF has begun research on the status of women in the media worldwide. The new study, the Global Report on the Status of Women in the News Media, will measure the career progress of women in the news media and use the results to help advocate for change.
- In the midst of the HIV/AIDS/AIDS pandemic the IWMF set out to improve health reporting in Women and African Economic Development. Since 1998, the IWMF has trained Africa’s health reporters, elevated the status of health coverage and published two studies, Deadline for Health and Writing for Our Lives.
Publications
According to this report from the International Women’s Media Foundation, women represent only a third of the full-time journalism workforce in the 522 companies surveyed. The findings presented, conducted over a two-year period, offer a picture to date of women’s status globally in news media ownership, publishing, governance, reporting, editing, photojournalism, broadcast production and other media jobs.