European Journalism Centre and Facebook Journalism Project launch COVID-19 fund to support local news

Core funding will support community engagement, address critical business needs, and facilitate coverage of the pandemic. Applications open on Thursday 16 April for grants ranging between €5,000 and €50,000.

“All over Europe, local news organisations are facing a battle for survival,” said Adam Thomas, director at the European Journalism Centre. “Deeply affected by the commercial impact of COVID-19, journalists are providing essential coverage with minimal resources. Without urgent support, local and community media will be unable to fight misinformation and inform citizens. The European Journalism COVID-19 Support Fund is designed to protect journalists who are working closely with their communities during this crisis.”

Priority will be given to small and medium-sized news organisations supporting those communities most affected by the crisis.

“COVID-19 has exacerbated challenges that local news organisations are already feeling,” said Jesper Doub, director of News Partnerships Europe at Facebook.” With Facebook’s investment, and in partnership with EJC, these grants will help local organisations across Europe ensure they can continue to provide people with critical reporting and news to keep their friends, families and communities safe.”

Grants will be distributed across three tracks:

• Engagement Fund: grants to help local news organisations and journalists engage communities with short-term or one-off COVID-19-related initiatives.
• Emergency Fund: grants focused on providing specific financial support to address immediate and critical business needs.
• Innovation Fund: grants to facilitate innovative and useful technological journalistic coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic or technical news organisation projects with potential to scale.

Eligible costs will include those that cover staffers, freelancers, technology, infrastructure and advertising. EJC will decide upon and administer grant awards independently from Facebook. Grants are not dependent on the use of Facebook tools and products.

Applications for the first wave of grants will open on Thursday 16 April. Sign up here to be notified when the grant application process goes live.

The European Journalism COVID-19 Support Fund is run by the European Journalism Centre, in partnership with the Facebook Journalism Project.