Justice Baidoo Wins 'Best Feature Story' Prize At V4C Media Awards

Joy News’ Justice Baidoo has won the Voice for Change (V4C) Best Feature Story award for his coverage of malnutrition in northern Ghana.

At a short ceremony at the Plush Elmina Beach Resort in the Central Region, Justice’s story and that of two other journalists from the Ghana News Agency and the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) stood out for honours as the stories that had the most impact in the last year.

In February 2018 Justice travelled to the Nanumba North Municipality in the Northern region to report on the shortage of food supplements for malnourished children and how that was affecting an already dire nutrition problem in that part of the country.

Plumpy nuts- the food supplement supplied by the Ghana Health Service, had run out in the entire northern region for more than 3 months putting the lives of hundreds of children at risk.

The shocking images of malnourished children in his report, which sparked a national outcry, forced the GHS and the UN Fund for Children, UNICEF to resume supply of plumpy nuts to hospitals in the three regions of the north.

Head of the GHS also pledged to work with local entrepreneurs to begin the production of the food supplement in Ghana to ensure a sustainable supply of the life-saving supplement.

“Stories like what Justice told are the stories that drive change. I am aware of the challenges that stood in the way whiles embarking on that assignment but he and his crew persisted and brought out a story that caused change”, said Eric Banye, Country Director for the V4C Project.

Justice in a photo with GNA's Iddi Yire and GBC's Doreen Ampofo who also won awards

The V4C project is an initiative funded by the Netherlands Foreign Affairs Ministry and the SNV Development Organization that is resourcing journalists in Ghana to better report on critical areas such as post-harvest losses in farming, sanitation and climate change.

Over the last three years, the program has trained more than twenty journalists and supported them with resources to report on some of the issues that receive little attention in mainstream Ghanaian media.

FOLLOW JUSTICE’ WORK ON HIS YOUTUBE PAGE HERE:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7-4CObckTYUe2sGyh2Qt0A?view_as=subscriber