MEDIA ADVOCACY ELEMENTS

Media AdvocacyMedia advocacy refers to the strategic use of mass media along with direct participation of the members of civil society and opinion leaders, with the vision to bring any significant positive change in mass lifestyle or policy level. Actually media advocacy means, the use of media as a powerful tool in development communication’s process.Elements of Media AdvocacyTo make a media advocacy process to be fruitful in its working process, the strategy planner has to be aware about Media Advocacy’s element, which means some key-factors to keep in mind when someone is dealing with Media Advocacy.Communication GoalDefine clearly the goal. That means what is our objective by applying the media advocacy in the specific area.Target AudienceFinding out the key-audience is the second most important duty. Target mass might be of a huge number but there might be a limited number of people who can perform better in message conveying process to achieve our goal.The MessageClearly define the message what I want to convey to the target audience. The message will consist of the information which will focus on our goal.Key StakeholdersDetermine the most effective communication stakeholders through whom message could be conveyed to the target audience most effectively.Targeting the MediaTo identify which part of mass media will perform more effectively on the target people and use that particular media in the media advocacy is a vital element. Because wrong choice of it might turn the advocacy planning worthless.

Media Advocacy Guideline/ Hand Wash Program

The Issue The rural people and urban under-privileged class people of our country are seriously facing health threat from water contaminated diseases and infections like diarrhea, dysentery, cholera, skin irruption, and hook worm. Though they drink safe drinking water, but they are not safe from the disease threat. Identifying the Policy Solution The mass I have said about in the previous section have common phenomena, they are not aware about washing their hands before taking meals or after using the toilet, which results this sort of infection or infective diseases through the germs contained dirty hands. Identifying the Primary Audience In our case the first level audience will be the local government authority and local health department officials who can play a vital role to inform and educate the targeted mass if motivated properly. Here we have chosen them as they have directly involvement regarding the topic we have planned about. Identifying the Secondary Intended Audience The political leaders, Religious and intellectual opinion leaders whose word have a big influence on the target community can play a important role as the secondary intended audience in our case. Research about the Policy to be adopted or not A prior research about the issue has to be done before whether it will work on our focused issue or not. Is more or less like designing a prototype before the commercial production of any new innovation. Research the audience is notified about the issue or not It is very important to know about whether the targeted audience is prior-informed about the issue or not. If yes, then why they are not aware about it. To get the information its necessary to conduct a survey to gather the information from them. Review Data to show the targeted mass To make the people aware about hand-wash program it’s highly recommended to show some real life examples in front of them about its impact on daily life health. And for that reason it’s also necessary to go through a study that if the proposed example is viable for the audience or not. Which Media to choose In this case we have to understand that in which media the targeted audience has the access most. For example in case of our targeted audience Newspaper Editorials, Satellite TV Bulletins or Awareness E-Mails will not work out when radio announcement or BTV Public Service Announcement might work more effectively. Choose the best way to deal with Media Getting rich knowledge of communication skills to make the media work more powerfully to work for achieving our goal. This process also defines how effectively I can deal with the media to make my issue more attracted to the audience as well as the media representatives.

REPORT ON “BATIGHAR”

The course Development Communication and Media Advocacy (MSJ-205) of MSJ Department of University of Liberal arts, the students of the course has visited a development project `Batigher’, is a project of Bangladesh Institute of ICT in Development (BIID) in Singair, Manikganj.
As I said `Batigher’ is a development project of Bangladesh Institute of ICT in Development (BIID), cooperation with GrameenPhone to serve the village people with Information and communication technology for their benefit.
Helping in agriculture: they have a lot of program which actually very helpful for root level farmers. As they said they provide information’s about proper time of irrigation, using method of fertilizer and pesticide without any service charge.
Training programs: the `Batighar’ is giving training about how to operate computer including Basic Office Management Course, and Basic Graphics Course. They have an excellent and easy English learning program with ‘English Learning Games’ for school going children.
Other services: `Batigher’ also providing some informative services like Visa information, passport information, driving license information, Internet browsing, Email Service. In this case they charged a little cost.
It can be said from my own observation or point of view that the ‘Bathigher’ is a business place for the unemployed people and an information center for the village. But they are not very familiar with their all facilities or service. They are founded `batigher’ about 4-5 month before, but their performance is quite good.
People are not very concern about the name `batigher’ infect, but the people are very familiar with the service. If they want to be a sustainable project they have to more careful about their service and the participation of local people.