IJ4EU awards €190,000 to freelancers for cross-border investigations

The independent jury has selected 12 cross-border teams for funding in the first round of the IJ4EU Freelancer Support Scheme, which supports teams of journalists working outside of newsroom structures.

Run by the European Journalism Centre, IJ4EU’s Freelancer Support Scheme is designed for teams composed predominantly of freelancers who collaborate on transnational investigations into topics of public interest in Europe and beyond. It offers funding alongside mentoring, training and networking opportunities.

The selected investigations address issues ranging from environmental crime and illicit finance to disinformation, organised crime, labour rights and cultural heritage.

The selected projects 

The independent jury awarded a total of €190,309 to 12 proposals. The successful teams involve 41 journalists based in 19 different countries. 

Here are summaries of the successful investigations and the awarded amounts, in no particular order:

• A cross-border team will investigate how archaeology has been instrumentalised in Crimea since Russia’s 2014 annexation, including state-led excavations, damage to cultural heritage and the use of archaeological narratives to legitimise occupation. Grant awarded: €11,250
• A cross-border team of freelance journalists from Hungary, France, Germany, and Cambodia will investigate the looting of Khmer temples and the role of European museums and private collectors in the illicit trade in stolen artefacts. – €20,000
• A cross-border investigative team of three freelance journalists will examine biofuel fraud and the opaque supply chains behind Europe’s green fuels. – €7,799
• A cross-border team of three freelance journalists will investigate the precarious conditions and low wages faced by predominantly female workers in Southeast Europe’s automotive supply industry. – €5,675
• A cross-border investigation will examine how authorities in northern Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands are failing to tackle the nitrogen crisis as livestock farms expand and communities and ecosystems suffer severe pollution. – €12,100
• A cross-border investigative team will map cases of illegal adoptions from Colombia to Europe, identifying those responsible and giving voice to adoptees and families affected by a decades-long practice that has received little attention from authorities or the media. – €17,000
• A cross-border team will investigate the transnational funding and political influence of an ultra-conservative religious network across five European countries, tracing opaque financing used to lobby against reproductive and LGBTQIA+ rights. – €16,735
• A cross-border investigation will examine the role of organised crime in European online betting and digital sports. – €20,000
• A soon-to-launch Mediterranean collective of investigative journalists will coordinate a cross-border project examining abuses linked to the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure. – €20,000
• A new chapter of the award-nominated Scrap Wars investigation will examine metal scrap flows from Gaza, building on previous reporting into scrap exports from war-torn countries. – €19,800
• A cross-border team of journalists based in Italy, Spain, Belgium, and Sudan will investigate how gold linked to conflict zones reaches European weapons markets. – €20,000
• A cross-border team will investigate how a TikTok-based propaganda and disinformation scheme linked to the cancellation of Romania’s 2024 presidential election was exported to Bulgaria, and how actors behind the Romanian operation were able to shift activities to a third EU country without apparent law-enforcement intervention. – €19,950

About the Freelancer Support Scheme 

The Freelancer Support Scheme is one of two grant schemes offered by the Investigative Journalism for Europe (IJ4EU) fund, which supports cross-border, collaborative journalism in the European Union and beyond.

The Freelancer Support Scheme runs in parallel to the Investigation Support Scheme, managed by the International Press Institute. 

The next call for applications under both the Freelancer Support Scheme and the Investigation Support Scheme opens on December 1, 2026.

Interested in previous IJ4EU projects?? Check out the projects section on the IJ4EU site.