To fill the void of local news reporting, ICFJ and Malaysiakini will create a network of locally-based citizen journalists trained in journalism skills and armed with high-tech reporting tools. To empower and give voice to marginalized and often abused immigrant workers, the program will bring media trainers from their originating countries to train citizen journalists and help create native language news websites with stories drawn from their experiences throughout the country.

Samuel Kwaku Agyemang of Metropolitan Television (Metro TV) in Accra participated in the 2011 Unilever Journalism Exchange Program for journalists from Ghana. Agyemang was named the Best Journalist of the Year in Ghana in 2009.

Over the years, journalists of color have had few opportunities to work as foreign correspondents. That’s especially the case in today’s media environment, with sharp cutbacks by many news outlets in their international coverage. At the same time, communities of color rarely receive coverage of global issues that directly affect their lives, from the migration of jobs overseas to wars fought by minorities serving in the U.S. military.

Siddhartha Dubey is a Knight International Journalism Fellow who is leading the World Media Academy Delhi, the only journalism institute in India that teaches students to report across multiple platforms, with hand-on, practical training in print, TV, online video, audio/radio and social media.

Líderes Digitales launched in March 2011 with a four-week online course on multimedia journalism for a group of U.S.-based Hispanic journalists.