O-ECO

The O Eco Association was founded in 2004 by two well known journalists and a respected political scientist in Brazil. Journalists Marcos Sá Correa and Kiko Brito were for many years editors of one of the most important newspapers in the country, Jornal do Brasil. Scholar Sérgio Abranches was already known for his classes at Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and his compelling articles in large circulation magazines. The idea behind creating a non governmental organization was to put together a team of experts to write on environmental issues.The Association has set as its main aim to create a network of young journalists all over Brazil with enough skills to combine into unique coverage of environmental issues.

The effort of joining experienced scholars and young journalists has also given origin to the main project of the Association, the environmental news website O Eco (www.oeco.com.br). This project was only possible due to donations from important institutions such as the Avina Foundation and The Hewlett Foundation.

During the last five years, the website has grown into one of the most celebrated environmental news services in Brazil. O Eco was the first media outlet in the country to offer in-depth coverage of issues such as corruption on management of forest resources, monitoring deforestation in the Amazon and the impacts of climate change on biodiversity. Surveys have shown that the news provided by O Eco influences decision makers. For example, a questionnaire carried out in 2006 showed that, at that point, roughly 60% of frequent users were directly or indirectly involved with jobs in the environmental sector.

In 2009, the O Eco Association has decided to innovate once again in creating new projects which will strengthen our capacity of dealing with issues in the whole Latin American continent, including the translation of the website content to English and Spanish.

Finally, it is worth mentioning that O Eco has won important prizes domestically and internationally due to the quality and commitment with environmental information. In 2006, we received a mention of honour from the Interamerican Press Society (IPS) and in 2008, the website's project The Route Of Smoke (http://www.trajetoriadafumaca.com.br/ ) won a special grant from Avina Foundation for journalistic investigation. More recently this very same project won the highest prize of the Earth Journalism Awards, which was celebration at the UN Climate Change Conference, in Copenhagen December 2009.