U.N, World Food Program
- 1. World Food Programme This case study shows how the United Nations Word Food Programme’s (WFP) need for a real-time international news service and evaluation programme was met by Delahaye Medialink’s news digest service. It explains how this ‘Daily News Digest evaluation news service’ has evolved over the last twelve months and how it is not only helping the WFP to measure the content and efficacy of media coverage, but now it is also serving as an early alert system to address mis-reporting, mis-representation and poor interpretation of the facts surrounding the reporting of the work done in highly sensitive situations throughout the world. (Haiti, North Korea, INDEX Darfur/Sudan). Work of the WFP 1 Set-up in 1963, WFP is the United Nations frontline agency in the fight against global hunger. In 2003, WFP fed 104 million people in 81 countries, Who the WFP helps 2 including most of the world's refugees and internally displaced people. WFP Challenge 3 Scheduled to go into operation in 1963 as a three-year experimental programme, WFP was up and running before it could walk. An earthquake A Fresh Approach 4 hit Iran in September 1962, followed by a hurricane in Thailand in October. Correcting Press 5 Newly independent Algeria was resettling 5 million refugees. Food aid was Reports urgently needed and WFP supplied it. It has never stopped. Taking Evaluation 6 Since 1996, WFP has been governed by the WFP Executive Board, which To Present consists of 36 Member States. The Executive Director, appointed jointly by the UN Secretary General and the Director-General of the FAO for fixed More Content, 7 five-year terms, sits at the head of the Secretariat of WFP. Stronger Relation- ships Special points of WFP Mission interest: • Stop ‘mis- As the food aid arm of the UN, WFP uses its food to: reporting’ • Stop ‘factual inac- • Meet emergency needs curacies’ • Stop ‘incorrect sto- • Support economic & social development ries’ • Global news • The Agency also provides the logistics support necessary to get evaluation service food aid to the right people at the right time and in the right place. • Partner approach to a world beating • The WFP works to put hunger at the centre of the international organisation agenda, promoting policies, strategies and operations that directly benefits the poor and hungry.
- 2. Who does the WFP help? Page 2 • Victims of natural disasters like the Mozambique floods in 2000 or Hurricane Mitch, which affected one million people in Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatamala in October 1998 • Displaced People - both refugees and internally displaced persons that are forced to leave towns and villages in places like Kosovo and Sierra Leone. • The world’s hungry poor, trapped in a twilight zone between poverty and malnutrition • WFP also believes that women are the first solution to hunger and poverty. Women not only cook food. They sow, reap and harvest it. Yet, in many developing countries, they eat last and least. How does the WFP fight hunger? WFP is the world’s largest international food aid organization combating hunger in underdeveloped nations with severe food shortages. The frontline stretches from sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East to Latin America and Asia & the Pacific. Rescue: WFP stands on a permanent state of alert, ready to mobilise food aid for delivery to natural and man-made disaster areas. Rapid Reaction: WFP’s rapid response team draws-up contingency plans designed to move food and humanitarian aid fast into disaster areas. The WFP works closely with the other members of the UN family, governments and NGOs, offering its logistics expertise to guarantee the delivery of all kinds of humanitarian aid. Rehabilitation: WFP food aid also serves as a means to get disaster- affected regions back on their feet. Deterrence: Malnutrition gnaws away at the most valuable asset in any country’s development: its children and its workers. Food aid is one of the most effective deterrents against long-term poverty. Development: The WFP kick-starts development by paying workers with rations to build vital infrastructure, and in offering children food aid as a reward for going to school.
- 3. The WFP Challenge Page 3 The WFP wanted a reliable and useful media intelligence and evaluation tool that provided a comprehensive service covering all WFP mentions across all principal national newspapers in a number of core donor coun- tries. International consultants (Deloitte & Touche) assessed the impact of the WFP’s press and media operations internationally and reported that the organization was making a strong impact upon the world’s media. What the WFP now required was a reliable system to measure that im- pact. This was particularly true in donor countries, where the media plays such a significant part in shaping the size and use of the overseas aid budget at a political level. The WFP tried several suppliers prior to coming to Delahaye and had been unhappy with the quality of service received. So, in the summer of Countries included: 2003, the WFP signed an agreement with Delahaye to take its web based Daily News Digest service covering news stories about the WFP that ap- UK peared in international ‘top-line’ major papers that covered 13 of its ma- France jor donor countries. USA Finland Denmark The Delahaye solution Sweden Norway Germany • Track WFP Press Releases and Spokespersons that had been cited in Netherlands these releases. (See Figures 2 & 3 attached for full lists and examples) Italy • Capture all WFP coverage across the defined media in all major donor Australia countries Canada • Deliver a daily news service to all regional WFP communication offices Japan (around 35 worldwide) • All foreign language content summarised and translated into English • Each story has an interactive link back to the original news source – or it would have a full text copy of the same story “If the WFP was to have • All available to WFP executives around the world using a web based a meaningful evaluation delivery tool tool that helped its daily • Content is searched and updated twice daily decision making, we had • All content on the web site is categorised and searchable by - Key Words to design it so that it - Media Type offers both real-time - Reporter needs and with classic - Spokesperson ‘historical drill-down - Press release reporting tools to the - Dominant issues/messages - Stakeholder groupings client.’ - By country Norman Clements - Specialist comment Managing Director Delahaye Europe
- 4. Early Stages of the Project Page 4 A new team took control at WFP in acy of the service, so that it could Rome – run by communications become a tool that could assist experts Neil Gallagher and Brenda them in day-to-day decision making. Barton. They wanted more news coverage of a greater number of In early 2004, the WFP appointed a news titles and more immediacy. new Scandanavian WFP chief. His Last February, they authorized an team would capture clips from the extension of the reading list covering region (Norway, Sweden, Denmark major publications from all donor and Finland) and would provide the countries and a fresh country was information for the main quarterly added (Ireland). reports only. To compensate for the loss of these countries on a These changes were driven by daily basis, Ireland was introduced internal WFP demand as more staff to the survey and the current set of signed up to the Daily News Digest publication across the remaining system. With more demand came countries was thrown wide open to requests for wider coverage. The better reflect the realities of press new WFP team were also curious coverage of the WFP global com- about ways to improve the immedi- munications work. A Fresh Approach As part of this new agreement, outside standard European work- WFP Chief Public reached between Delahaye and the ing hours and organise an emer- Affairs officer, Brenda WFP in February 2004, Delahaye gency email alert system that sends Barton commented: agreed to shift focus of its service ‘warning’ of breaking news to key from simple reporting of news to far WFP staff – so that when they ar- “We have found the more pro-active support of the day- rive at their desks the next day service extremely helpful to-day work of the WFP. they have a clear indication of the at all levels. We are able WFP-related stories that are mak- The new focus was on the develop- ing the news. to measure where we ment of a international multi-country stand in terms of our news ‘radar’ system that could alert Delahaye also sought to work on work on a global scale. the WFP to breaking news that could ways of assisting key WFP commu- We also have a team at have a major impact upon its busi- nication staff to track, monitor and Delahaye that actively ness. This meant that although Dela- assist in helping the WFP to haye was to plan for the eventual ‘protect the brand’ from press mis- supports us whenever we ‘switching on’ of deep media evalua- takes and misreporting that gave a need to act fast to correct tion in mid 2004, it was also to seek wrong impression of the WFP and media inaccuracies.” ways to monitor stories breaking its works around the globe. Tracking Media Errors A plane was downed recently in the discovered whether this story ap- Aruba Mountains of Sudan. It was peared anywhere else. In fact, no feared that WFP staff were on board. WFP staff were involved and as the This story came from a Khartoum- story broke on Italian websites De- based stringer’s report to that effect lahaye fed the information back to which was transmitted through the WFP – who ensured that the ANSA. Delahaye’s DND system information was corrected and re- picked up this story and quickly tractions issued where required.
- 5. Press reports of 2 WFP staff killed in Sudan Page 5 The Daily News Digest picked up press mentions of this story – relayed this to WFP communications staff in Rome – who confirmed the inaccuracy of the story and dealt with it accordingly. This was done by getting the main German newswire – Deutsche Press Agentur to issue a public retraction. Reports of US Government aid cuts of 20% Reuters had reported that the U.S. government was cutting the WFP’s aid budget for 2004 by 20%. However these numbers were merely early esti- mates and revised upwards as circumstances unfolded during the year. De- lahaye tracked the story globally and supplied copy to WFP to enable them to correct the story wherever it appeared. It only gained exposure in Reuters, Australia and Canada – and the mis-reporting was stopped. Reporting on news coverage of regional disasters As the lead UN Agency into Ryongchon in North Korea after the train dis- aster in April, WFP Regional Director, Tony Banbury, saw his comments syndicated globally in a matter of just a few days. Inside just 6 days, the World Food Programme news digest site carried over 600 mentions on how the WFP was leading the UN effort to help the victims of this tragedy. The Daily News Digest website remained up-to-date throughout, publishing the news from across the tracked countries – making it available to WFP staff each morning. Tracking the Overthrow of President Aristide in Haiti As the crisis broke the WFP was a prominent source of news for the world’s media with comment from Guy Gavreau, WFP Country Director, capturing a large share of the headlines in February’s crisis. As one of the lead agencies into the region – the news media closely monitored the World Food Programme attempts to try to distribute food to 5,000 people security situation permitting. Floods and earthquakes devastate Haiti and the Dominican Republic In May stricken Haiti was hit once more by torrential rains that led to flood- ing. The media reported the WFP lead role in delivering food and water to remote farming towns (such as Mapou) where reporters saw for the first time the worst devastation from deadly floods that inundated parts of Haiti and the Dominican Republic and left Mapou under 10 feet of water. On-going humanitarian disaster in Darfur Western Sudan With initial unconfirmed reports of mass exodus and ethnic cleansing in the Darfur region - the head of the World Food Programme, James T Morris, led a major UN delegation to the country that saw that the worst had in- deed happened. After visiting Darfur he said: "What we are witnessing in Darfur and in Chad is a dramatic humanitarian crisis, no doubt one of the worst in the world today, a crisis of massive displacement, critical humani- tarian needs and extreme levels of violence and fear."
- 6. Taking Media Evaluation into the Page 6 present Media evaluation has traditionally been about reporting and analysing issues “Having a reliable after the event – with traditional reports landing on client desks two to service in place has three ‘working’ weeks after the Quarter reported on has closed. The re- helped us enormously on port has depended upon the provision of clips to the media evaluation com- a day-to-day basis. It pany by either the client of the PR agency. In many instances, this has been the major ‘anchor’ preventing reporting on a communications cycle being has saved us man hours closer to the end of the period under scrutiny. Media evaluation agencies and effort and aided us in now have the ability to operate in real-time across a 24 x 7 media world approaching the media that knows no global boundaries. for successful retractions or factual corrections.” Media evaluation is evolving and tools such as the News Digest now play a role in keeping global communication professionals ‘on message,’ ‘informed’ Francis Mwanza, and ‘up to date’ – and making day-to-day decisions in real time. This has not Senior Public Affairs been the traditional territory of the media evaluation company – it has his- torically belonged to the PR agency. No longer need a media evaluation Officer, WFP company concentrate on simply measuring the ‘outcomes’ and nothing more. Now it can influence the formulation of communication decisions – some- times to the extent that it can stop news happening (as is the case in this instance where Delahaye has helped the WFP to quash ‘mis-reporting’ and ‘mis-representation’ in several major news stories about the global aid agency). This can also now be done on a global rather than a national stage. A further lesson is that there are no longer any constricting boundaries in terms of languages or countries. In Delahaye’s case, with offices across the globe, it is possible to offer a 24 x 7 news digest service that covers up as many countries as a client desires – all backed by customer service that of- fers a radar alert support system to clients who operate on the multi- country, multi-continent scale.
- 7. The Future - more content, more Page 7 evaluation, more analysis - all in real time The WFP will soon move to an uprated and more automated service and delivery platform. In essence deep evaluation techniques will be available as and when the news stories are posted. In this way stories can be compared to the WFP’s values vis. meeting emergency needs, supporting economic and social development, provide Top Ten Donor Countries logistic support to get food aid to the right people at the right time in the by Dollars (July 2004) right place and the important ‘value’ of putting hunger at the centre of the international agenda. USA 228 814 358 It will monitor stories so that it becomes possible to track who it is help- ing through its work – according to the international media in donor coun- Japan 68 598 761 tries. Tracks will be set up to assess who benefits from WFP work in each story Germany 51 215 755 – victims of natural disasters, displaced people, the world’s poor and hun- gry trapped in poverty and how the role of women and how they figure in Nether- 40 925 659 relation to such issues. Delahaye already monitors news coverage that lands reflects news of the work of the WFP in combating hunger in underdevel- oped nations with severe food shortages. The frontline stretches from Sweden 39 070 664 sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East to Latin America and Asia & the Pacific. Norway 33 683 834 In the ‘old’ News Digest there is a breakdown by country of news coverage – and by some core aid agency issues such as: GM crops/food and HIV/Aids. UK 29 376 321 This work will continue on the new version of News Digest. All news coverage will now include fresh tracked key words in all target languages Denmark 28 152 157 that capture news stories that explain ‘how’ the WFP achieves its objec- tives. These ‘positioning messages’ will focus upon reporting on: rescue, rapid reaction, rehabilitation, deterrence and kick starting economic and Canada 27 336 299 social growth. Switzer- 18 024 110 Whenever a news story of some significance breaks – WFP team members land invariably contact Delahaye requesting the re-focusing of the tracking efforts upon this new story so that it can help them to assess the issue fully.
- 8. WORLD FOOD PROGRAMME Rome HQ Brenda Barton Mailing Address Chief Public Affairs Officer Via C.G.Viola 68 tel: +39-06-6513 2602 Parco dei Medici fax: +39-06-6513 2840 00148 - Rome - Italy brenda.barton@wfp.org Tel: +39-06-65131 Francis Mwanza Fax: Senior Public Affairs Officer +39-06-6513 2840 tel: +39-06-65132623 fmwanza@wfp.org Professionalism. Speed. Expertise. No one delivers as broad a range of research services as Delahaye. With responsiveness and insight, we help our clients improve their reputations, sharpen their competitive edge and prove the return on their PR investments—ROI. Whether you are communicating internally or externally, via broadcast, online or in print, our experts deliver timely research-based intelligence that demonstrates the true value of Pub- lic Relations to decision makers. Steve Virgin Delahaye Medialink Europe Director of Business Development 16 –22 Baltic Street London EC1Y 0UL Tel: 00 44 20 7251 7225 Fax: 00 44 20 490 4258/251 7231 Email: svirgin@delahaye.com