1 - Do no harm

Ensure that assistance does no harm to public interest media.

This may include:

Ensuring that engagement reinforces democratic norms, human rights standards and principles, media freedom, media sustainability, journalist ethics, journalist safety, information integrity and editorial independence.

Avoiding approaches that displace local actors, distort salaries, risk editorial independence, confuse information with institutional communication, imply contradictory injunctions of stated interests and values.

Ensuring that assistance is gender sensitive, gender transformative and intersectional to promote equality and equity in media content, media coverage, reporting and editorial practices, selfregulatory equality policies, business and management strategies and public policy making.

Endeavouring that any use of media to achieve other development goals (“media for development)” upholds journalistic standards of quality, professionalism, and independence, and supports core media resilience.

Taking all precautions to ensure the safety and security of project beneficiaries and implementers, for example by developing and implementing risk mitigation strategies. • Requiring that implementers have record of upholding the highest professional standards of journalism and program implementation in the media sector.