GRC News Spring 2021

“We should be coming out and staking our claim.”

This is Catherine Lafferty’s story — one of language, land, education, family, abuse, and coming home. We’ve been bringing you a series produced and authored by Indigenous peoples in Yellowknife, Canada. Our Turning Points series explores alcohol use, addiction, recovery and healing. The series is published in partnership with PBS NewsHour Weekend. Keep an eye on our Twitter feed for upcoming stories.

Two years ago, a team of students from The Global Reporting Program travelled to The Gambia to investigate the little-known fishmeal industry. What they found was a supply chain that is polluting the ocean, damaging human health, and decimating local fish stocks. The New Yorker’s recent long-read Fish Farming is Feeding the Globe. What’s the Cost for Locals? builds on the GRP’s reporting and features footage from our team’s multimedia project The Fish You (Don’t Know You) Eat.

Written by Outlaw Ocean Project’s Ian Urbina, the New Yorker piece focuses on Chinese-run fishmeal factories in Gunjur, The Gambia. These factories are outcompeting local fishermen and releasing dangerously-high levels of heavy metals into the ocean. Urbina gained access to the Golden Lead factory and found evidence of illegal fishing and inhumane working conditions on Chinese-operated vessels along the coast. You can read reports from the New Yorker and GRP to learn more about the hidden costs of fishmeal and how it is fuelling the global aquaculture industry.

Greenland Divided Over ‘Polar Silk Road’

In episode 6 of our podcast, On China's New Silk Road, host Mary Kay Magistad examines how the Belt and Road initiative is extending across new frontiers – this time to the Arctic. Magistad published an article for ABC Radio National's Sunday Extra outlining how China intends to invest in what would be the world's second-largest rare earth mine, securing China's monopoly over rare earth minerals.

Catch excerpts of On China's New Silk Road podcast episodes on ABC Radio National's Sunday Extra show by Julian Morrow.

GRC Contributor Melissa Chan Bucks Chinese Censorship via Clubhouse App

Melissa Chan spoke to Lizzie O’Leary on the popular Slate What Next: TBD podcast about her experience with the new startup social audio app, Clubhouse. During the episode titled, How Clubhouse Cracked China’s Firewall, Chan described tuning in for hours, listening to uncensored conversations between Chinese, Uyghurs, Hong Kongers, and Taiwanese. The access was short-lived as the Chinese government moved quickly to block domestic access to the app, curtailing open dialogue and free political expression.

Be sure to listen to China’s Digital Silk Road, where Chan reported on China’s export of its hardware and software.

Collaborative journalism is often long, difficult and complex work. It takes time and money to find these connections and develop these stories. This is why we need your help. Now, more than ever, access to sustainable funding is critical. Please consider supporting our work with a tax-free donation. With your support, we can do even more of this reporting.

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