Regulatory Authority in Serbia empowered for impactful outreach on media literacy

In an ongoing commitment of the European Union and the Council of Europe to bolster the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media in Serbia (REM) and advance media literacy in alignment with European standards, a two-day training for trainers session was successfully conducted, for the employees of the REM.
The training provided practical skills, knowledge, and recommendations necessary to promote media literacy and enhanced REM’s capacity to organise and deliver media literacy activities to a variety of target groups. Additionally, a presentation of best practices of other regulatory authorities in Europe was used to foster a better understanding of the scope of potential activities and end beneficiaries, in promoting media literacy.
European Standards, including the 2018 EU Audio-Visual Media Services Directive and the Recommendation CM/Rec(2018)11 of the Committee of Ministers to member States on media pluralism and transparency of media ownership, emphasise the importance of media literacy and the key role of Regulatory Authorities in promoting it.
The training session was organised within the action “Protecting freedom of expression and of the media (PROFREX) in Serbia ”, that is part of the joint European Union and the Council of Europe programme “Horizontal Facility for the Western Balkans and Türkiye”. It aims at contributing to an improved environment for the exercise, in particular by journalists and media actors, of their rights of freedom of expression, in a more pluralistic and safer media environment, in line with the standards as set by Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights.