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Africa Media Review Vol. 2 No. 3 1988© African Council on Communication Education
Effective Reporting of Rural Africa:Towards Improved Strategies
and Practices
Ikechukwu E Nwosu*
ABSTRACT
This article makes a case for improved news coverage ofthe rural areas of Africa as a vital component of Africannations" rural and national development efforts. It offers acontextual definition of rural news reporting in Africa, andprovides a theoretical and philosophical framework thatshould guide the African rural reporter on the job.
The article went further to critically examine thedominant strategies for rural reporting, rural news gatheringstrategies and sources, some specialized techniques forpackaging rural news reports, and the general and specificchannels for transmitting rural news reports.
In addition to the universalistic news packagingapproaches which should be contextually modified andapplied by African rural news reports who should live in therural areas with the ruralites, this articles also recommendedthe Screw Model and the Promo-News forms of rural newspresentation and systematically explained how these can beapplied.
*Dr, Ikechukwu E Nwosu is a Senior Lecturer inCommunications at the Department of Marketing, Universityof Nigeria, Enugu Campus, Enugu, Nigeria.
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Vers une amelioration des strategies et des pratiquesrelatives a une information efficace sur les zones rurales en
Afrique
RESUME
Dans cet article l'auteur fait de l'amelioration de lacouverture informationelle des zones rurales d'Afrique unelement vital des efforts des developpement de nationsafricaines. II offre une definition contextuelle de lacouverture des zones rurales et donne un cadre theorique etphilosophique qui devrait servir de guide au reporter africain.
L'article fait un examen critique des strategiesdominantes de reportage rural, des sources des strategies decollectes de I'lnformation sur les zones rurales, de quelquetechniques specialisees de confection des nouvelles du monderural et enfin des canaux generaux et specifiques detransmission de ces informations.
Les methodes de redaction universalistes de nouvelles surle monde rural doivent 6tre contextullement modifiees etappliquees par les journalistes africains qui devraient vivredans le zones rurales avec les populations; l'articlerecommande aussl le methode Screw et les formes de Promo-Information et explique systematiquement comment ellespeuvent 6tre appliquees a la presentation des informationsrurales.
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Introduction
Most countries of Africa now have rural development asthe focus of their national socio-economic and technologicaldevelopment programmes. The place of communication in allthis is recognized but often under-emphasized, given lip-service or not given adequate attention by governmentsofficials and other change agents. The mass media are notless guilty in this regard. 1 For technical reasons, negative-attitudes, wrong perception of their professional roles and forsimilar reasons 2, they tend to neglect, under-report ormisrepresent (misreport) the rural areas.
This inadequate attention by government agents and themass media should stop. The urban-rural dichotomy in newsreporting and writing which is skewed against the rural areasmust discontinue. These changes must take place before wecan hope to achieve the much-desired mobilization of therural people and resources for development of the rural areasand the nation of Africa. These changes need to take place toobefore we can achieve any reasonable balance in the nationaland international information flow patterns, which we havebeen clamouring for.3
This paper focuses on news reporting of and writing for therural areas. It is aimed at examining the philosophy,sociology, and strategies for effective rural news gatheringand news writing that all help to ensure people's participationin development communication in Africa.
Defining Rural News Reporting
Rural news reporting is seen here as a specialized type ofreporting that requires specialized treatments and specializedskills. But the fact that it shares many other areas ofcommonness with other types of news reporting and writingshould not be lost sight of.
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It involves mainly reporting and writing news with a ruralfocus or emphases. Rural news is news written and reportedfrom rural perspective, it is news and other related materialsgathered and packaged mainly in the rural areas as opposed tothe so-called rural news written for ruralites in urban areas,by urban dwellers and with urban biases.
Rural news is news that informs, educates urbanites orurban elites and governments about the needs, aspirations,problems, successes, joys, values and general life of the ruraldwellers, and informs and educates rural dwellers aboutgovernment policies, activities, programmes, philosophies,materials, ideas and such other factors they might need forsurvival, progress or improved living standards. Ruralreporting provide the news and other related material thatconstitute the vital information and communicationcomponent of the much-publicized and recommendedintegrated approach to rural development, which is defined asa consciously-formulated, planned, and executed systematicand multi-sectoral programme, aimed at integrating themarginalized people of the rural areas into the mainstream ofbetter living, as opposed to mere existence or subsistence.4
Sociology of Rural News Reporting
All types of news reporting are increasingly being studiedand better understood as sociological processes while the newsand other materials that come out from these processes areincreasingly being received as the organizations products ofthe media and other societal organizations involved inproducing them. 5 This is essentially an application ororganizational and general socio-logical theories in the studyof news reporting. It can also be seen as the study of thesociology of news as an off-shoot of the general sociology ofknowledge.
In fact, one of the modern adaptors of this approach,Bernard Roshco, equated news to knowledge and divided newsinto "acquaintance with: news and :knowledge about: news.According to him, ".acquaintance with:" types of news storiesrefer to straight and some superficial news coverage, while:knowledge about: news types refer to indepth orinterpretative reporting of events".6 Roshco's two types anddescription of news are also similar to Todd Hunt's "event -
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centres" and "process-centre": news types which he developedin his criticisms of the reportorial process. 7 Here again,: event-centred: news is more of straight news reporting, while"process-centres; news refers to indepth coverage of events.
These are two news reporting styles that should meanmuch to the rural news reporter. The key message of thenewsmaking or sociology of news approach to the rural newreports is that a thorough knowledge of the process of makingor "manufacturing: news will immensely increase hisunderstanding of how much the final product of news, iscreated, its possible uses and abuses, its portends andlimitations, and the various organizational, political andother societal factors that act as constraints in the massmedia;s attempt to construct or destroy realities through thenews.
The sociology of news approach will also enable the ruralnews reporter to understand and appreciate the role of ruralsociology in community and rural development or rural lifein general. It will help him to be familiar with rural socialorganizations, social relationships, roles and statusstructures, norms and values of the rural communities andindigenous associations, organizations, and institutions.This approach will also help the rural reporter to master andutilize the tractional communication processes and channelsthat include the opinion formation systems, channels ofinformation sharing, instruments of expression, feedbackmechanism, opinion leaders who are usually early learners,innovators, adoptors.8 and significant - others, and include"emirs", "obas" or "Igwes", other community leaders or evensome common people that play leading roles in the opinionprocess.
Philosophy of the Rural Reporter
To be effective in this specialized area of journalism and masscommunication, the rural reporter or anyone engaged in ruralnews reporting must be continually guided by a well-definedand contextually-adjusted rural-oriented journalistic orcommunication philosophy. We take philosophy here to meana basic theoretical and pragmatic body of thought that shouldguide a person, group or professional practice and whichshould be determined by such factors as national or
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community values or ideas, cultural realities, systems-survlvalist and developmental imperatives.
We propose that, that philosophy be called the RuralismConcentric Circle philosophy (RCCP). 9 This is a journalisticor communication model that emphasizes among otherthings the utilization of communication for the promotion ofrural community ideals that include balances development,cultural integrity, self-reliance, unity, patriotism,conscientization and generally better life for the ruralites. itis also a pragmatic, developmentalist or utilitarianphilosophy of communication that places first the ruralcommunities and their development and integration to thedeveloped areas, it is at the same time village-centric andnation-centric, because even though its focus is on thedevelopment of the rural areas, its ultimate goal or result isoverall balanced development of the nation throughsystematized, conscious and equilibrated integration of therural and urban areas.
The above RCCP philosophy is in line with what seems tobe emerging national philosophy in most African countrieswhich is based on self-reliance and social justice, and inwhich socio-economic planning is carried out through theappropriate authorities in the development district, localgovernment areas, states and at the national level. 10. it isalso in line with the "Ruralism: philosophy recommended byAbangwu Arapa which, according to him, is a value system, anideology for mass mobilization that transcended all ethnicand parochial identities .. and a socio-political shuttlemechanism that enables development and planning to flowfrom down up to the upper echelons of socio-economicactivities. 11 As he further pointed out, Rurism is firmly basedon the bio-economics of our cultural roots and is predicatedon ten principles that include self-reliant integrateddevelopment from grass root that minimizes the drift tourban centres, self actualization through balancestechnological development and employment for urbanitesand ruralites alike, guaranteed socio-economic and politicalequilibrium and freedom, and sustained loyalty, disciplineand patriotism. 12A rural reporter that is guided by all these ideals has startedon the right path. These ideals will help him to constantlyquestion the presently Western-dominated definitions of
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news and news values 13 with a view to developing new ormore appropriate ones for his special brand of reporting andcontextually applying those that need no change.
General Strategies for Rural Reporting
Many strategies have been applied and are still beingapplied in many places for reporting the rural areas. Thecontemporary rural reporter should be familiar enough withthem to be able to advise on them and utilize the best possibleones.
First, there is what can be aptly described as the "touch-and-go" approach to rural reporting which is similar to whatBernard Cohen called "the bushfire reporting syndrome". 14in the realm of international news reporting. This kind ofrural reporting comes in forms that include rushing to cover arural area only when a major calamity has befallen thatcommunity or a major event like a highly entertainingfestival is taking place. It also includes giving a particularrural community intensive coverage for a short period inorder to highlight its problems, people and issues, and thenmoving off to another rural community. These kinds of"touch-and-go" journalism do not make for effective, balancedand sustained coverage of the rural areas and are not in linewith the philosophy of rural reporting we discussed earlier.They should be discouraged.
There is also the second major approach of dependingsolely on government information offices to report and writenews about the rural areas for the mass media and thegovernment which is still used in many areas. Theinadequacy of this approach is obvious. For one thing,government information officers posted to rural areas areusually not many or enough to effectively cover the ruralareas. They are also generally ill-equipped and sometimesinsufficiently trained and motivated to do good jobs.Injection of excessive government biases or perspectives intotheir stories can sometimes also reduce the potency of whatwould have been good rural news reports and analyses, so, weshould not just depend on government information officersand their outputs or releases, even though we can use whatthey put out to supplement or expand the scope of our ownmedia reportorial efforts.
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Related to the above is a third approach which involvesdepending on rural agricultural, health and other changeagents for the procurement of rural news reports. Theproblem with this approach is that these groups of changeagents are not trained Journalists, even though they may havetaken crash-courses on communication. We should nottherefore expect them to properly gather, write or packagerural news stories in manners that will satisfy the- aims andobjectives of rural news reporting we had discussed earlier. Atbest, we should use these change agents and their products asuseful additional sources of information for rural newsreporting.Some media organizations also depend entirely on newsagencies' reports for their rural reports for their ruralreportage. 15 This might be alright if the news agenciesconcerned are so well-staffed and well-equipped that they canassure effective and sustained coverage of all ruralcommunities and all sector of rural life that includeagriculture, health, cultural activities like festivals, rites,rituals, fetishes and their significances or contributions todevelopment.
But the best approach to effective coverage of the ruralareas seems to be the establishment and sustenance of a well-trained, well-oriented and well-equipped rural press corps byevery media organization on a permanent basis. Effectiverural reporting requires that the reporters live with andunderstand the rural people and the rural environments,interactions, events, problems, and issues they will bereporting and writing about. This will be relatively moreexpensive than the other approaches, but its pay-off isdefinitely higher. We have to adopt and encourage it if we areserious about using rural reporting to promote ruraldevelopment in Africa.
News Gathering Strategies and Sources for RuralReporting
Initially, the rural reporter faces much more difficultiesin the area of news gathering than most of his counter-partsin other sectors of the news business. But with time, if heshows enough interest in the ruralites and their problems orjoys, makes and sustains the right contracts, stays in the
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rural communities long enough and does much more, he findsthe process of rural news gathering a lot easier than before.
His first task is to procure as much background about theruralites. their lives and environments as possible, developnoticeable empathy for them, participate in their dailyactivities and so be seen as part of the community. 1 6Establishing rapport between him and the opinion leaders,local teachers and priests (including priests for thetraditional religions), rulers, leading farmers, leaders inother areas of rural business, government officials and suchpeople will help him very much in this direction. But hissources should not be restricted to these "significant-others",but should include all categories of ordinary rural dwellerswhose views and activities are also important in rural newsreporting which is largely humanist and people-oriented.
The rural reporter should also work closely with thosethat might be regarded as other occupational or professionalspecialists working in the rural areas because they areauthentic and regular sources of news. They include healthworkers, development researchers, agricultural experts, othervarious rural scientists, technologists, engineers, teachers,archeologists, librarians, anthropologists and other suchspecialists that focus their efforts in the rural areas. Therural reporter should also not forget the many rites, rituals,festivals, funerals, age-grade and similar rural groupactivities which he should not only cover objectively butreport and analyse their significances or relationships todevelopment. Stories from such sources can inform,entertainment, educate and persuade people. Criticalanalyses of rituals and fetishes related to such negative andanti-development cultural traits like the 'OSU' caste system InNigeria, 17 for instance, may not only educate people enoughabout it but may lead to policies and actions that may lead toits extinction.
To do well in rural news gathering, the reporter must haveto respect and apply the five generally-accepted principles ofbest-reporting because rural reporting is really specializedkind of beat-reporting. The five principles are that the beat-reporter must be always prepare, alert, persistent, wary andmust try to be there at his best when the news break to avoiddepending on secondary sources or hear-say journalism" 18.He must also form the habit of using documented, archival or
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already published materials to place his rural news stories inproper perspectives and make them more useful to those thatwill read, view or listen to them.
It is also obvious that the rural reporter needs to use to themaximum the standard journalistic techniques of opinionand information or even panel interviewing. He should alsoapply the techniques of journalistic observation that includedirect, unobtrusive and participant observation. . The wellknown techniques of investigative journalism should also beapplied by the rural reporter to procure the "facts behind thefacts" or hidden pieces of information that are not easilyavailable. This will help him to uncover criminal, anti-social, and evil practices that may be acting as cogs In thewheel of progress In the rural areas or disrupting peace andorder in the rural areas.
The rural ness reporter should also learn how to apply thetechniques of precision news gathering that involves usingsocial scientific methods to generate secondary or primarydata that can be used to make rural news stories moreauthoritative, reliable, quantative and verifiable. 19
The above-discussed news gathering techniques shouldhowever be seen as merely suggestive because much reallydepends on the rural reporter's initiative, ability anddedication to duty. These qualities will help him to create hisown original techniques and make necessary situatlonaladjustments that may be needed in using the abovetechniques. For example, a rural reporter may succeed inemploying the services of some village teachers, priests andothers who are educated enough to produce initial write-ups orreports from which he will prepare his final report. Byapplying the now popular Three Cs Model of News Gathering20 - Comb, Call and Cultivate, the rural reporter can assureregular flow of information into his 'news-chesf which hewill use as raw materials for writing thorough and effectiverural reports that will enable him to be recognised as anauthority in this specialised area of news reporting. If headopts this model, even mundane rural places such as a localpalm wine bar can provide him with regular sources of news.
Packaging Strategies for Rural News Reports
It will be assumed in this paper that the rural reporter hasalready acquired the rudiments of general news writing before
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attempting to go into the specialised area of rural newsreporting. So, we shall offer in this section only those tips oftechniques we consider the rural reporter should add to hisnews writing arsenal and always bear in mind when he istrying to package for readership, viewership or listenership,the many facts and opinions he had gathered by applying themethods we examined in the previous section of this paper.
It is important for the rural reporter to try hard to writehis news mostly from human angles because most of the timerural news events and issues have to do with rural people andtheir environments. Even when rural news is directly relatedto things, rather than people, it should still be written asmuch as possible from a human angle that will bring out howthat think or object relates to people. Rural news audiencesare more likely to expose themselves to such stories and relatemore to them and such stories tend to be more persuasive oreffective.
Furthermore, the rural news writer should be familiarwith alternative models of news writing or packaging. This isbecause he needs a variety of writing approaches tosatisfactorily explain the rural world to his audiences. He alsoneeds varieties of approaches not only to reach his variegatedaudiences, but also to lend sufficient appeal to the multi-faceted stories of rural, human and national developmei.ithat he will be reporting to his rural and urban audiences on aregular basis.
What are these alternative models? In addition to thepopular and conventional inverted-pyramid models of newswriting, the rural reporter should also use the pyramid ortriangle model of news presentation. This is a direct oppositeof the inverted pyramid model with the climax or mostimportant part of the story being written in the lastparagraph.
The pyramid or triangle form of news presentation maynot be very effective for the day-to-day fare of quick "event-centred" news stories that are most common in popularjournalism, but it will be most useful for "progress-centred"and unfolding stories of the rural setting or rural developmentthat do not always fit into fast journalistic writing 21. it alsohas the added advantage of being closer in form to the storytelling format in most African villages or rural settings whichbegins with "Once upon a time" and ends with a befitting
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climax. This will help the rural audiences of rural news torelate to it better.
The rectangular or chronological order of news writing isanother form of news presentation that will be quite useful forthe packaging of most process-centred rural news stories.Here, the events and facts of the story are presentedsequentially or logically, more in their order or occurrencethan their order of importance. This model of news writingalso enjoys the advantage of resembling the African traditionor format of story-telling popular in our villages.
There is also the Screw Model of news writing which willbe very useful for presenting rural news stories. It rejects theinverted-pyramid model idea that the facts or points of everynews story is readily rankable in importance, and does not seethis as always possible in practice. The Screw Model adoptsthe top portion of the inverted-pyramid model, but then levelsoff the other points of the story, thus making room for pointsor information that are of equal weight. It also makes roomfor the inclusion of minor details that are clearly identifiableas minor details. These details appear at the tail or sharppoint of the screw that stands for the last paragraphs of thestory.22
We also have the literary news writing form as anotheralternative model of news presentation that the rural reportershould utilise from time to time. It has been around for threecenturies, but came to the limelight in the late 1960s and early1970s during the New Journalism era. It is growing popularcurrently in many parts of the world.
It has been described as the "objective re-creation ofexperience realised through subjective means"23 It combinesthe techniques of depth reporting and literary writing intrying to paint a picture of reality in a news report. It uses suchliterary techniques as narration, scene, drama summary,process, point of view, idioms, proverbs, rhythm, irony andother figures of speech, extended dialogue and imagery tomake a rural news story alive and appealing to its audienceswho can easily relate to it.
Other Forms of Presenting Rural Reports
All we have examined so far in this section refer to theconventional or straight news lorm of rural reporting. But the
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rural reporter should also use other forms for packaging hisrural reports for greater effectiveness. These other forms ofnews packaging allow for greater flexibility and provide moreroom for creativity. But the form to be used largely depends ofthe reporter's or editor's purpose or what they want to achievewith a particular news story.
It also depends on such things as suitability of the facts ornature of the story, the anticipated audience, the emphasisand effects desired. For example, if a story has to do withmany complex factors, multiple sources, different moods andinterpretation of the same facts by sources, the conventionalstraight news form may not be suitable because such storiesusually go beyond mere inventorial presentation of facts toinclude explanations, consequences, correlation of facts oropinions, analyses and much more. They are the process-centred and knowledge-about stories we discussed earlier.
In this paper we shall take the specialised news packagingform known as News Analysis to be one major alternativeform that can be used to write many of such news stories thatdefy the straight or conventional news presentation form aswe pointed out above. The News Analysts form can effectivelyand better be used for any rural news story that focuses on theforces at work in any news situation, competing interests,differential points of view, possible explanations orinterpretations of the whys and hows of any news situation.
An example is a story that analyses and records theprocesses involved in the abolition of an anti-social practice(e.g. the Osu caste system or high bride-price) that impedesdevelopment and peace in any rural community. The NewsAnalysis form can also be used to write news stories that dealwith consequential analysis of news situations which focuseson the consequences of a news event or situation for theindividuals, groups and institutions in a particular ruralcommunity and beyond it. It must never be forgotten however,that news analysis must remain basically news in content,language and purpose. It must be based on news facts and mustconvey much information, in addition to doing other thingsof performing other functions. It is very useful in trendreportage and futuristic news stories that examine and reporton such issues as a new agricultural invention, educationalpolicy, social reforms, economic programmes or tax reforms,their effects on the rural community or the nation as awhole.24
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Another effective form of news presentation or writing inrural reporting is what we shall call the Promo-News form.This is a blanket and convenient term that can be used todescribe the different promotional or promotion-orientednews stories and tit-bits that the rural reporter could use topromote assorted types of rural communities, communityprojects, government rural development policies and projects,rural development strategies, slogans and rural mobilizationplans. Examples of such promo-news exist in some Nigeriannewspapers, radio and television that have tried to pay someattention to rural coverage. But they are still far fromadequate. For instance, the "Rural Star" which is usually acentre-spread insert in the "Weekly Star" has carried suchstories as "Focus this Week: Umuchu Community", "Focus thisWeek: Amofia Ngbo Community". It has also published suchpromotional slogans as "Farm to feed well" and "Support yourcommunity development project". The "Rural Star" has alsopublished rural development-oriented promo-news tit-bitslike the following: 2 5
(1) One Community, One Project
Have your heard that every rural community inthe country is expected to initiate and completeone self-help project, however small, this year?Do you know that government will give matchinggrants only to communities that embark on self-help projects? Have you registered yourcommunity development union? Do not be leftout. Register your community developmentunion and embark on some self-help NOW!
(2) War Against Guinea Worm!
Do you live in the guinea worm infested area ofAnambra State? Are you suffering from guineaworm attack? The Anambra State Governmenthas set up a task force on guinea wormeradication in the State. You can help thegovernment to help you by preventing the spreadof the disease. You can do this by:Reporting all cases of guinea worm attack to the
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task force through your nearest health extensionworker.Boiling all drinking water expected not be safe.Promoting all practicable measures to keepinfected people from wading into public watersources or "Okpuru".PREVENTION IS THE BEST GUARANTEEAGAINST GUINEA WORM!
There is also the Photographic News form that the ruralreporter should use regularly. This is in addition to thestandard journalistic requirement that he illustrates hisnews stories, whenever possible, with photographs becauseone good photograph tells more stories than a thousandwprds. Here, a good photograph with a well-written caption oroutline is used to convey the news very graphically and withgreat efficacy. Photographs of major rural historic places,local people, development project sites, farms, festivals,rituals and implements can be used to prepare very effectiverural photographic news reports.
The "Rural Star" again offers us very good examples of theuse of photographic news forms in rural news reporting. Twocase examples from this paper will again be enough toillustrate the point we are making. The first one is taken fromtheir "Ruralites of the Week" photo-news series. It was abeautiful picture of two Gwari women that was accompaniedby the following very descriptive caption:
'With tender babies strapped at their backs, withscarcely any dresses to shield them against the blazingsun, with no shoes to protect the feet from thescorching earth, and all this with a full weight on theshoulder (full baskets of firewood), these Gwari womenpresent a typical picture of the agonies of rural life,particularly for the women. Who says our rural womenare not hard workers?
Think what you will, these are our ruralites of theweek".
The second example of rural photographic news was aphotograph of one typical traditional medium ofcommunication (Oramedia) in Nigeria, the wooden gong.
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entitled 'When the Ikoro Sounds" and accompanied by thefollowing very informative and educative caption"
"When the 'Ikoro' sounds, the entire communitystands at alert and awaits further information ordirective. The 'Ikoro', a giant wooden gong, Is afamiliar feature in most communities of AnambraState. Usually installed at a community square, ormarket, the 'Ikoro1 is a very effective means ofcommunication in the rural communities.
Our cameraman recorded this Ikoro at the Umuchucentral market, in Aguata Local Government Area ofAnambra State".
One other useful form of rural news packaging is theUtility form of news presentation. This is also called the How-To-Do-It form of news packaging. Utility news stories are veryutilitarian in function and will come in handy in reportingvarious aspects, activities or processes involved In specificrural development projects. They are useful in publicenlightenment campaign reporting, and teaching health,agricultural and environmental or personal cleanlinesstechniques or practices to the ruralites through indepthreporting. Such news stories should be highly informativeand should be presented in lucid and simple styles, so that thenon-expert or the semi-literate ruralites can easilyunderstand them. It could be written in the interview formatin which the facts of the utility of how-to-do-it story flowsfrom the mouth of an expert. Examples include stories ongrowing fish in rice fields, how to apply fertilizer, and theminisett' method of yam production.
Another form in which the rural report can be presentedincludes the historical form 26 which is used to write acurrent news story that is more or less a historical accountpresented by a news source in a modem version and which hascontemporary significance for rural growth, enlightenment,peace or such factors. It also includes the confession andpersonal experience news forms that can be effectively used toreport the unique experiences and intimate revelations ofwell-known or ordinary rural dwellers from which otherruralites or even non-ruralites can get useful lessons orknowledge that will help them in their own lives.
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Related to these two forms is the personality sketch formwhich in rural news reporting should not be restricted to thechiefs and opinion leaders, but should include ordinary localpeople like wine-tappers, black-smiths and carpenters whoqualify for news attention by outstanding performance,oddity or some other rural unique news values that may notnecessarily fit into the news values of conventionaljournalism. Such stories can again be well-presented instandard interview or dialogue formats.
In addition, rural news can adopt the precisionjournalism form of presentation when suitable. This is a formthat comes in very handy when the rural reporter has anarray of secondary and primary data in the form of tables,graphs or other quantitative or statistical modes which hewould have to use in packaging his rural news. There aremany other forms.27 The ones discussed here should spark offthe creative abilities of the rural reporter and lead him tomany more imaginative and interesting forms of packaginghis rural stories to "catch" his audiences and move them toaction.
Finally, in packaging his rural news stories, the ruralreporter should make sure that he is familiar with and cansatisfy the publication or news presentation requirements ofthe ultimate channel or medium of publication for his story.The most popular media of rural news reports seem to be thelocal or rural radio broadcasting systems and the rural, local,provincial or community newspapers and magazines thathave a rural focus. A rural reporter who is writing for any ofthese specific media only has the task of mastering their in-house and general policies, styles, formats, angles andtechnicalities and can easily write his stories to satisfy them.
But a rural reporter who is a freelancer or who is workingfor an "all-media medium" like a news agency has the moreonerous task of ensuring that his stories are versatile, broad-based or general enough in terms of style, content, language,format, angles and such factors in order to satisfy the peculiarneeds of the various media that will use them, maybe withlittle adjustments by them here and there. All rural reportersshould also be familiar with the various types of traditionalmedia of communication (Oramedia), know theircharacteristics and potentialities, and so be able to transmittheir stories through them whenever appropriate.
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Summary and Conclusion
We started this paper by stating the importance of ruralnews reporting and writing for rural and nationaldevelopment and pointing out the inadequate attention it ispresently receiving among government and media insiders:We then moved from there to define what we mean by ruralnews reporting, provided the theoretical framework for thepaper by examining the sociology of rural news reporting andoffering a philosophical framework that should guide therural reporter. We proceeded by examining the dominantstrategies for rural reporting, rural news gathering strategiesand sources, some specialised techniques for packaging ruralnews reports and the general and specific channels fortransmitting rural news reports.
Having done all this, we feel comfortable enough to justconclude by reminding all of us that in the present age ofinformation, machines and factories alone cannot bringabout rural or national development, because they need to beoperated by human beings who are -well-enlightened orinformed, motivated, persuaded and properly organised ormobilized through well-planned and executed informationpolicies that include adequate reporting of the rural areas.
There lies the great importance of rural reporting and therural reporter. Therein lies also the great need for mediastructures and communication training institutions in Africato play a more effective new role in the area of ensuringpeople's participation in development communication.Improved practices and training in the area of rural reportingconstitute one effective way through which they can play thisrole more efficiently.
Notes and References
See Frank Okwu Ugboajah, "Media Habits of Rural andSemi-Rural (Slum?) Kenya", Gazette, No.36, 1985,pp. 165-176.
See Ikechukwu E. Nwosu, "Mass Media Discipline andControl in Contemporary Nigeria: A Contextual CriticalAnalysis", Gazette, No.39, 1987, pp. 17-29 for an
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6.
examination of more of these reasons in the Nigeriancontext.
See Ikechukwu E. Nwosu, "The Role of Research in theGlobal Information Flow Controversy", Gazette, No.31,1983. pp.79-88 andNwabu Mgbemena and Onuora Nzekwu, "Africa and theNew World Information Order", in Onuora Nwuneli (ed),Mass Communication in Nigeria, Enugu" FourthDimension Publishers, 1985, pp.50-61, see alsoSylvanue Ekwelie, "Africans Must Redirect InformationFlow", Media Development, Vol.32, No.l, 1985, pp.27-29.
See Ikechukwu E. Nwosu, "Research and Training forRural Development Communication", Africa MediaReview, Vol.1, No.2, 1987, pp.66-86.
See Gaye Tuchman, Making News: A Study in theConstruction of Reality, New York: Free Press, 1978:Gerbert Gans, Deciding What's News, New York:Pantheon Books, 1979, and Jeremy Tunstall,Journalists at Work, London: Constable Press, 1971.
Bernard Roshco, Newsmaking, Chicago: The Universityof Chicago Press, 1975, P.99.
7. Todd Hunt, "Beyond the Journalistic Event: The ChangingConcept of News", Mass Communication Review, Vol.1,April 1974, pp.23-3O.
8. See Aja Okorie, Op. CiL pp.5-8.
9. This is a situationally modified version of the earliermodel proposed by Ikechukwu E. Nwosu in"Communication Training and Research in Nigeria", inMass Media and the African Society, Nairobi,: ACCEPublication, 1987, pp.367-388.
10. See Soji Akinrinade, "Special Report/PoliticalEconomy", Newswatch, April 13, 1987, P.35.
11. Abangwu Arapa, "Rurism as Nigeria's New PoliticalOrder", Weekly Star, May 17 and 24, 1987.
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12. Ibid.
13. See Olatunji Dare's view and those of other participantsIn News Agency Journalism Training Workshop: Reportof Proceedings, Harare: Frederich NaumannFoundation, September, 1986, P.78.
14. Bernard C. Cohen, The Press and Foreign Policy,Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press,1963.
15. Tony Momoh must have had this in mind when he statedthat the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) was well-placed togive effective coverage of the rural area - Reported inDaily Star, May 25, 1987, P. 16.
16. See Ikechukwu E. Nwosu, "Mobilizing People's Supportfor Development: An Analysis of Public EnlightenmentCampaigns in Africa", Africa Media Review, Vol. 1, No. 1,1986, pp.48-65.
17. See Igwebuike Romeo Okeke, The 'OSU Concept in IgboLand, Enugu: Access Publishers (Nigeria) Limited, 1987.
18. See Brian S. Brooks, et al. News Reporting and Writing,New York: St. Martin's Press, 1980, p.297.
19. See Philip Meyer, Precision Jownalism, Bloomington:Indiana University Press, 1979, and Idowu Sobowale,Scientific Journalism, Ikeja, Lagos: John WestPublishers, 1984.
20. See Ikechukwu E. Nwosu, A Guide to Christian Writing inAfrica, Enugu: Christian Communication International,1987, p.69 for detailed explanation of this model and itsapplication to news writing and reporting for ruraldevelopment.
21. See Ibid. p.90.
22. See Edward J. Smith, "Screw Model Has Advantages OverInverted Pyramid", Journalism Educator, Vol.33, No.4,
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1979, pp. 17-19, for more detailed explanation of thismodel and diagrams to illustrate it.
23. See R. Thomas Berner, "Literary Newswriting: The Deathof an Oxymoron", Journalism Monograph, Number 99,October 1986, and Michael Schudson, What Time Meansin a News Story, New York: Gennett Foundation, 1986.
24. See Everette E. Dennis and Arnold H. Ismach, ReportingProcesses and Practices: Newswriting for Today'sReaders, Belmont, California: Wadsworth PublishingCompany, 1981, pp.170-171.
25. These slogans and promo-news and photo-news can befound in "Rural Star" sections of Weekly Star, 29thMarch, 1987, 5th April, 1987 and 24th May, 1987. Seealso Kathy McAdams and John Sweenerj's indirectadvocacy of what we called Promo-News in this paper intheir article "Copywriting and Newswriting NeedSimilar Skills", Journalism Educator, Vol.41, No.4,Winter, 1987.
26. This is one of the forms discussed by Olutunde A.Oladimeji, Creative News and Features Writing; Lagos:Directorate of Information, Nigerian Navy, 1985, pp.47-51.
27. There is, for instance, the cultural reporting techniquesor forms recommended by Norman H. Sims and David L.Eason, "Reporting Cultures Penetrates Realm of FeelingsDrives: Teaching Cultural Reporting", JournalismEducator, Vol..36, No.l, 1981, pp.6,7,47 and 48.
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