This programme supports capacity building for in-depth reporting and investigations on environmental and climate issues. It is part of the Earth Investigations Programme, supported by Arcadia.
In 2025, we received 154 applications – more than double compared to 2024. After the consideration of our jury, 14 projects were funded for a total of €258,885, offering training, mentorship, and professional development to more than 900 journalists (here it is a complete list of all projects financed via this grant).
At the same time, 13 projects were implemented (some of them had received funding in 2024). They spanned a range of initiatives, with the purpose to build investigative reporting capacity across borders, cultivating data, visual, and multimedia storytelling expertise with regards to environmental and climate stories, offered fellowships and long-term professional development programs.
Many programmes took place online, reaching journalists in numerous European countries. In-person training also played a strong role, with events held in Arles, Novi Sad, Barcelona, Madrid, Chisinau, Modena, Ferrara and Budapest, drawing both local and international audiences.
The formats vary, but the purpose remains the same: making environmental investigative journalism in Europe stronger and offering journalists an opportunity to gain the skills to tackle the complexities of covering environmental issues across national borders.
Zooming in
Let’s have a closer look at one of the initiatives we supported: Magmatic School of Environmental Journalism. It trained early-career journalists from southern Europe through a hands-on, five-month programme. Led by writers with experience at international outlets such as National Geographic, Undark and the Guardian, the course focused on strong environmental storytelling.
The participants were introduced to the fundamentals of environmental and narrative journalism while examining the Mediterranean’s climate challenges. Supported by dedicated mentors throughout the programme, they reported on topics including mining, the energy transition, pollution, climate law and overtourism.
The programme led to cross-border collaborations and publications in outlets such as the Guardian, Context, Voxeurop and Climate Home News.
This new edition - Magma Environmental Reporting Fellowship - aims again at training nine journalists, with the special focus on environmental investigations with the link to science journalism, turning sources into compelling characters, international reporting, collaborative journalism, and the basics of freelancing.
Discover more
On our website you can always find detailed information about the projects supported through this programme. Follow the Carbon, the Money and the Data focuses on building skills for investigative climate reporting, cross-border programmes like Strengthening Environmental Investigations Across Borders is linking journalists from Africa and Europe, Environmental Journalism School is targeting Russian-speaking journalists in exile, Learning by Doing offers the possibility for participants to put into practices their learnings.
Previous initiatives also concentrated on innovative storytelling approaches, for example Visual Storytelling for Environmental Journalism and Visualising Desertification, which explored visual, data-driven, and multimedia methods to tell complex environmental stories in new and engaging ways.
