Deadline: March 17, 2022
Applications for the JournalismfundEu Modern Slavery Unveiled Grants 2022 are now open. This grant program aims to enable independent journalistic investigations into the exploitation of Asian victims of human trafficking and forced labour in Europe.
Cross-border teams of professional journalists can apply for a grant to cover working time and/or expenses to investigate, document and expose aspects and cases of forced labour, cross-continental trafficking and other issues related to the exploitation of Asian victims in Europe. Next to a grant, teams can also apply for a mentor to provide assistance with either the focus of the investigation or the need for competences in a specific skill.
Grants
- The Modern Slavery Unveiled grant program will distribute in total €320,000 over 4 application rounds.
- The total available amount to be distributed per call will be €80,000.
A grant can cover two types of research costs:
- Expenses (both for freelance journalists and for employed staff journalists). These can include travel, visa, accommodation, translation, fixers, access to pay-databases, FOI requests, legal screening, etc.
Following expenses are NOT eligible for a grant: investments goods (such as IT equipment, mobile phones, …), office costs, production costs, food and beverage, per diems. - Research time (only for freelance journalists).
The grant can only cover costs for research, not for production.
Eligibility
- Cross-border teams of at least two journalists from Europe and/or Asia can submit a proposal for a journalistic investigation.
- The applicants must be professional journalists (written or audio-visual press). Personal references and/or references to earlier work are essential in that respect.
- Only natural persons can apply for a grant.
- The project proposal must focus on an aspect or case of the exploitation of Asian victims of human trafficking and/or forced labour in Europe.
- The project must be published by at least two professional news outlets in at least two different countries. Letters of intent for publication from at least two professional news outlets are required.
- Investigative journalism published by professional media in any form is eligible, no matter whether print, online, broadcast or cross-media. All journalistic end products qualify for a grant: newspaper and magazine articles, radio and television documentaries and series, photo-reportages and books, podcasts and journalistic non-fiction books.
Assessment Criteria
The jury will assess the applications based on these criteria:
- relevance for the thematic focus of this program, i.e. the exploitation of Asian victims of human trafficking and/or forced labour in Europe
- added value compared to mainstream coverage
- cross-border or cross-continent aspect
- quality of research methods and presentation/storytelling
- feasibility of the investigation, timeline and budget
- team structure and experience of the applicants
- work effort requirement
- pooling research capacity and knowledge
- being a watchdog of institutions, policies and money
Finally, the jury will also take into consideration the variety within the global selection of granted projects. This means diversity in terms of:
- region (both regarding stories and team members)
- topics
- methods and approaches
- publication forms
- team composition
Application
After a one-time registration with your email address, you can access the online application form. You can freely navigate through the form to see which information you need to provide in your application. This includes:
- personal details of the team members
- information about the intended investigation
- information about the dissemination of your story
- a detailed budget
You will be asked to upload the following documents:
- copy of passport
- CV
- letters of intent from professional news outlets
- a detailed budget (use the budget template)
One team member can start a draft application. He or she can then invite multiple people to collaborate on the online draft. The online application-in-progress can be saved and further edited at any time.
For more information, visit JournalismfundEu.
