VINC- Venice International News Conference – Fifth Edition

27^th November 2010
Palazzo Labia â€ Sede Rai

The allâ€news channels meeting was launched in 2005 as an occasion for the main information players to gather and exchange views. Organized by COPEAM (network of the Euroâ€Mediterranean audiovisual operators), RaiNews24 and Rai Venezia, in 2007 this rendezâ€vous chose the City of Venice as its premises and becomes VINC – Venice International News Conference, thanks to the collaboration of the Venetian local institutions.

VINC 2010 edition â€ “Global fears, global hopes”

Global fears, global hopes: in an even more connected and interâ€dependent world, each news that is produced and inserted in the media circuit can lead to reactions and perceptions – so emphasising collective anxieties or hopes – having a growing impact on the global public opinion.

In an international context already deeply marked by the serious economical crisis, the year 2010 has been struck by important catastrophes – both natural, such as the earthquake in Haiti and the flood in Pakistan, and environmental, like the black tide in the Mexican Gulf – that have had a deep media impact and have pushed the “green” issues at the centre of the global agenda.

The power of images gives audiovisual operators an efficient tool to inform and educate citizens on topics of high collective interest. Recent movie success’ like the documentary “An inconvenient truth”, produced by Al Gore in 2006, the growing number of scientific infotainment TV programmes, the importance taken by environmental news all demonstrate how the topics linked to the future of our planet meet a wide public interest and how the demand for such information is increasing.

CONCLUSIONS
The event took place in the days between the United Nations Climate Change Conferences on the Kyoto Protocol, held in October 2010 in Tianjin (China) and in Cancun (Mexico, from 29th November to 10th December 2010). For this reason, representatives of the European institutions and international organisations - such as the U.N. agency IFAD and the European Parliament - committed in these fields were also invited to this edition and contributed to an original debate between media professionals and institutional bodies.

In this context, the representative of the International Academy of Environmental Science (IAES), based in Venice, introduced the last steps of the robust campaign promoting the creation of juridical institutions (International Environment Criminal Court and European Environment Criminal Court) and of research and dissemination tools devoted to environmental topics.
On this regard, Mr. Jo Leinen, President of the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety Committee of the European Parliament, sent a video-message (see video) expressly addressed to VINC participants where he explained the intention of the E.P. to present in Cancun this key-project.
An interesting exchange on awareness raising about environmental questions took place between the attendants of the Venice meeting and Mr. Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Nobel Peace Prize, connected in video-conference from Buenos Aires.

A final declaration (read the declaration) was drawn and shared by the participants focusing on the role of the all-news media in dealing with these matters, the setting up of an exchange device of media contents and the possibility of creating and Environmental Communication Observatory, based in Venice.

Read the presentation