Two Canadian journalists will receive the 2022 Michener – Deacon Fellowships for Investigative Journalism.
Stéphane Blais, an environmental journalist with The Canadian Press, will focus on the environmental impacts and economic benefits of mining lithium; and freelance journalist Rob Csernyik will investigate the evolution of the relationship between gambling and suicides in Canada.
The Michener fellowship jury appreciated that Blais’s project will focus on a key element used in the manufacture of electric batteries, the demand for which is currently exploding around the world. These mines are mainly in Indigenous territories, and little is known of their environmental and economic impact. Blais’s work will ultimately be published in French and English through the various platforms of La Presse Canadienne and The Canadian Press.
Csernyik’s project seeks to identify how the toxic relationship between gambling and suicides has evolved, and investigate what, if anything, governments and public health authorities are doing to address the problem.
Csernyik’s project will be published as a long-form investigation in The Walrus Magazine and Reader’s Digest Canada, with interest from the Local News Data Hub to help develop and share the data set, and create data-driven, localized stories on the issue.
The 2022 Michener fellowship recipients will be honoured at the annual Michener Awards ceremony. Plans for this year’s ceremony are underway, and further information will be available soon.