The winners received their media awards on Wednesday evening at the MAZ in Lucerne. The jury of the Real21 media award justifies the main prize of Andreas Babst as follows: "The author shows us with pictures of Kiana Hayeri in his reportage. 'Little dreams' impressively and hauntingly people who have been so badly affected by their living conditions and who have brought them into such distress that they no longer have the strength for great hope. He takes us to the inhospitable desert region of the extreme southwest of Afghanistan on the border with Iran and Pakistan and makes a journey with those who dare not dream of Europe. It is the vast majority of Afghans who leave, return and live between borders."
The second prize goes to Sarah Nowotny for her reportage "Illegality and exploitation: caregivers from Eastern Europe fight back".. The report presents Polish women who care for our elderly in Switzerland. Ukrainian women who care for the elderly in Poland. And old people who are left at home by their daughters to earn money with the care work abroad, and who wish that their daughters would find work at home. The report is also about women who have had enough of miserable working conditions and low wages.
The reportage "Like Bernese money in Norway" by Quentin Schlapbach and Cedric Fröhlich was praised by the jury as local journalism "at its best". It traces the line from the point of origin of the Bernese power plants to on-site in harsh Norway, where existing environmental regulations threaten livelihoods there. It's the long road along the responsibility of a Bernese corporation that local media usually can't take.
Also nominated for the Real21 Media Award were Adrienne Fiechter and Iwan Ruslyannikov for "Yandex - a tech company creates zombies" published in the Republic, as well as Sacha Batthyany and Katharina Bracher for their NZZ-Backstory "Not welcome".
]]>Once again this year, the Real 21 jury of experts nominated five journalistic contributions that appeared in a Swiss-German medium. Now three of them have been awarded prizes. First place is endowed with 8,000 Swiss francs, the second with 4,000 Swiss francs and the third receives 3,000 Swiss francs.
Due to the corona virus, no award ceremony took place on site. The laudatios for the respective winners were recorded on video.
Reports from Chile, Mongolia and Tanzania
"Without bias and without taking sides, the author introduces us to the very different worlds and ways of life of the Swiss farmers involved in the land conflict and the Mapuche people," said the jury of the Real 21 Media Award, explaining the choice of Tilman Lingner. "The film is visually powerful and allows us to understand an intricate problem that began over 100 years ago and is still unresolved today." Lingner's reportage was broadcast in the program DOK of the Swiss television SRF and is still available in the media library.
Second place went to journalist Martin Theis and photographer Sascha Montag with the reportage "A Life in Extremes," which appeared in Surprise magazine. The reportage describes the story of a security guard in the capital of Mongolia who would have preferred to stay in the countryside. The author looks closely without judging. The watchman "stands for the fate of thousands and thousands of small farmers and nomadic herders in the global south. Climate change is robbing them of their livelihoods and forcing them into the cities."
The third prize goes jointly to Astrid Benölken, Hannah Lesch, Björn Rohwer and Tobias Zuttmann for the reportage "Transsexuality in Tanzania," which appeared in Team Magazine. The reportage is a touching portrait of a young transsexual, describing an impressive life story. It not only shocks and touches, it also gives hope, because the young transsexual did not let himself be broken even by a dramatic stay in prison. It rather awakened his defiance and pride and made him an activist who stands up for the transsexuals in his country.
The association "Real 21 - Understanding the World" was founded in May 2015. It is jointly supported by MAZ - The Swiss School of Journalism and Alliance Sud, the think tank of Swiss development organizations. On the one hand, it supports and promotes reporting in German-speaking Swiss media on topics of global development with a media fund. On the other hand, the media prize is awarded annually to three outstanding journalistic works. The media awards and the media fund are financed by contributions from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).
They are being honored for their outstanding journalistic work on global development issues. The award ceremony took place on Thursday at Lucerne City Hall.
The main prize of 10,000 Swiss francs goes to Barbara Achermann for her reportage "Das Frauenwunderland" ("The Women's Wonderland") from Rwanda published in Annabelle. In it, she impressively describes the rise of women since the horrific genocide in this central African country. Today, it has more women in parliament than any other country in the world.
Rafaela Roth and Simon Jäggi share the prize of 5,000 Swiss francs. On Watson, Rafaela Roth describes in "This is not for humans" a night in the Idomeni refugee camp on the Greek-Macedonian border. Her personally colored account is touching and gives the stranded people a face.
Simon Jäggi surprises us with "Suddenly Digital. The report, published in Surprise magazine, shows how the Internet is changing the lives of the Penan in the Borneo jungle for good. Simon Jäggi stands out as a precise and differentiated observer.
The association "Real 21 - Understanding the World" was founded in May 2015. It is jointly supported by Maz - The Swiss School of Journalism and Alliance Sud, the working group of Swiss aid organizations. On the one hand, it supports and promotes reporting in German-speaking Swiss media on topics of global development with a media fund. On the other hand, outstanding journalistic works are awarded annually with a main prize and a sponsorship prize.
The media awards and the media fund are financed by contributions from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.