Seminar Invites Students to Engaged Economic Media

Guests to a seminar sponsored by the Birzeit University Media Department and the Birzeit University Media Club discussed the role of media in economic development on April 10, 2014.

The seminar was chaired by Media Department chairperson Bassam Owaida and attended by a number of media specialists in the economic field: PADICO CEO Samir Hulileh, economics editor at Wafa News Agency Jafar Sadaqa and head of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate Abdel Nasser al-Najjar.

In his opening address, Owaida underscored the primary goal of the seminar, acquainting students with economic media, and nurturing a generation of journalists specialized in economics.

Owaida said that the event sponsors seek to strengthen students’ involvement and direct them to integrate into economic media.

Hulileh explained that the media is an important tool for changing the realities on the ground. He stressed that media in its various means has distinct character from other professions and becomes more important when media is linked to economics that leads to the production of economic media.

Al-Najjar asserted that value of the economic journalist lies in his/her ability to integrate economic control with figures, which are subject to analysis. He added: "We need a group of specialized reporters in all areas of journalism, not only in the economic field, pointing to the importance of having all the media associated trends that would eventually create an integrated press either economic or otherwise."

In the same context, Sadaqa confirmed that the existence of free press means the creation of a solid economic model, as what distinguishes economic press from others is what decisions it entails. Sadaqa said that "The main reason behind the absence of the so-called economic journalism/media is absence of professional economic journalist, in addition to lack of free and independent platforms able to take in, as much as possible, the free professional press materials.”