Award-winning journalists to train city hall, MIGEDC press
Two award-winning journalists lead a list of resource persons in the three-day Business and Interpretive Reporting Workshop organized for members of the Iloilo City Hall Press Corps and information officers of local government units under the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras Economic Development Council (MIGEDC).
Yvonne Chua, former training director of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, and Lala Rimando, business editor of Newsbreak Magazine, will share their knowledge with 20 participants in a workshop co-sponsored by the Iloilo City government and the Canadian Urban Institute, with funding support from the Canadian International Development Agency.
Set on 15-17 June 2007 with venues in Iloilo City and Guimaras, the workshop seeks to develop the media and information officers' competence in interpreting current events by providing analytical context to their stories for deeper public understanding, and in spotting and writing interesting business and economic stories.
Francis Gentoral, CUI regional manager, says the workshop seeks to equip journalists and information officers with the reporting skills they need to cope with the fast changing economic climate in the Metro Iloilo-Guimaras region.
Sessions in the workshop will be held in separate venues, starting at the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) in Iloilo City to the Guimaras Trade and Information Center (GTIC) in Jordan Guimaras. Participants will be lodged at the Villa Igang Resort in Nueva Valencia during the course of their training.
Atty. Raul Anlocotan, NEDA's Chief Economic Development Specialist, will also familiarize participants with economic indicators and statistical concepts, and teach them how to examine the state of the region by applying economic indicators and statistic concepts.
Prof. Jigger Latoza, director of the Coordinating Center for Research and Publications of the University of San Agustin, and CUI capacity development advisor Fe Salcedo, will explain to participants two competitiveness ratings that now serve as a new looking glass in looking at local governments.
Latoza will share the Philippine Cities Competitiveness Ranking Project of the Asian Institute of Management, while Salcedo will explain the Local Government Performance Management System developed by the Department of Interior and Local Government.
Rimando, who is speaker for business reporting, won a 2002 Siemens IT and Telecommunications award for an article on the wireless business ventures of the telecom duopoly in the Philippines. She has been a three-time finalist in the Jaime V. Ongpin Journalism Award.
Chua, who is speaker for interpretive reporting, was elevated to the Jaime V Ongpin Awards for Investigative Journalism's Hall of Fame in June 2005 after bagging the first prize three times in five years.
Since January 2003, she has been a member of the Commission on Higher Education's Technical Committee on Communication. She is a professorial lecturer at the University of the Philippines, where she teaches journalism part-time.