The Journalism Value Report: Mapping the State of Public Interest Journalism in Europe

The Journalism Value Report published today shows how important the European independent public interest media are for investigative journalism.

The report is based on answers from 174 newsrooms from 31 European countries and provides detailed data on the state of Europe’s independent media landscape, which is characterized by numerous small, often non-profit newsrooms.

The results of the study are particularly worrying for local media. Despite local journalism’s crucial role in maintaining democratic values, it is particularly prone to financial uncertainty. Compared to public interest newsrooms that report on national or global news stories, the local outlets generally generate the least amount of revenue, tend to offer particularly precarious working conditions, and have the worst financial perspective with a lot of newsrooms only able to secure operations for a maximum of six months.

The report recommends a number of different measures to strengthen the new sector. To build a nurturing environment for public interest media, it would be helpful to provide more core funding, allowing newsrooms to focus on long-term organisational development rather than being constrained by time consuming project funding. Additionally, implementing capacity-building, such as training in business skills and fundraising, in funding schemes would address the lack of expertise many journalists turned founders face. Finally, providing spaces for collaboration and knowledge transfer, along with reducing bureaucratic hurdles in the funding process, would facilitate peer learning and strengthen the overall resilience of public interest newsrooms.

You can read the full report here and visualize the results on an interactive map here.

The survey was conducted by Netzwerk Recherche between November 2023 and February 2024. The report was funded by the EU Commission and financially supported by the Journalism Funders Forum.

This two-year project is a joint collaboration between three independent European newsrooms, Átlátszó Erdély, Fumaça, Investigate Europe, the journalism network Netzwerk Recherche, and the Reference Circle, a self-organised network of independent European news publishers incubated by Arena for Journalism in Europe, which provides operational support.