At the 7th national contest for Environmental Journalism that was held in Tashkent on 20 December 2008, the SCA’s biannual newsletter Saiga News won the award for the Best Environmental Publication. Members of the jury noted that Saiga News has united every saiga range country, as well as the international community, in concentrating their efforts on saiga conservation. It’s the only known example of an environmental publication that publishes in all the languages used in saiga area (Russian, Uzbek, Kazak, Mongolian and Chinese) as well as in English, which makes it easily understood by all interested stakeholders and community members. During the contest we were informed by organizers that prize winners will be recommended for participation in international ecological journalism competitions. Who knows, maybe we will be lucky a second time!
The Managing Editor of Saiga News, Elena Bykova, said, “In Uzbekistan people read Saiga News in Uzbek and Russian. It’s accessible mostly by internet, but the general public in Uzbekistan, especially people from remote villages located within the saiga range, have no access to the internet. Therefore we also print the newsletter and take hard copies with us when we visit saiga places. Saiga News is a popular publication and we hope that people reading it will not only hear news and learn new ideas, but also be educated. In the last issue we highlighted details of our educational and embroidery training work in Uzbekistan, and illustrated these stories with photos of local people involved in these activities. So, when we bring them Saiga News and told them that so many people around the world read it, they were really happy and proud. They showed it to their neighbors and relatives and have become very popular persons at that moment! I am very pleased that through our work locals who live practically at the world’s end now feel themselves to be a very important part of the international saiga community”.