Journalism and informed citizens play are essential for democratic societies. However, journalism and informed citizenship in the EU, like elsewhere across the globe, have been greatly disrupted by the digital transformation and other social, political, and economic trends.

Many of the issues and trends affecting journalism, as well as many of the needs and strategies in media literacy are shared. Against this background, this project builds a consortium of truly European organisations with strong EU-wide networks of journalists, public service media, media literacy experts and teachers, and media academic researchers with the principal objective of enabling and facilitating bottom-up and multi-stakeholder dialogue and cooperation on crucial questions for journalism and informed citizenship in the EU.

The core objective of the project is to bring together and activate existing networks, resources and expertise in order to organize a European platform for deliberation on journalism and media literacy, with the festival as a central event and for the benefit of the profession, decision-makers and the citizens.

The objective will be achieved with four main activities:

1) Two editions of the European Festival of Journalism and Media and Information Literacy.

2) Developing the discussion platform for European Journalism and Media Literacy that will serve as the central repository and a key resource to drive a continuous dialogue and share European standards.

3) Producing and disseminating festival reports and recommendations, focusing specifically on EU policy and European standards for the journalistic profession and media literacy.

4) Engaging with local municipalities, universities, especially journalism schools, other relevant communities.

The aim is also to be open and attractive to citizens in the debate on the future of the media and to raise awareness on the role of journalism in democratic societies. And so the main events will be open to the general public also through the fair and showcases, where citizens can directly interact with various aspects of journalism and media literacy.

The first edition will take place in Florence, Italy in February 2024 and the second edition will be in Zagreb, Croatia in 2025. Watch this space for the latest updates.