Reporters Sans Frontières

Published on 11 June 2004

The Reporters Without Borders budget in 2004 was €3,235,928 and the financial situation remained steady. Self-generated funds increased and the organisation achieved a surplus while substantially expanding its activities.

Expenditure

Our main activity is research and publicity that enables us to expose press freedom violations and rally the international media to help free imprisoned journalists, bring out a newspaper that has been censored elsewhere and ensure that those guilty of serious crimes against journalists are punished.

• Research involves gathering and analysing information about worldwide press freedom violations, sending on-the-spot fact-finding missions and monitoring the plight of journalists in prison.
Publicity involves lobbying about the most serious violations through campaigns in the written and broadcast media.

When press freedom is seriously threatened in a country, we send assistance and fact-finding missions that meet with the authorities and local media and then highlight the situation in the country through the international media.

An assistance fund provides urgent medical, legal and financial help to journalists and media in difficulty.

Two annual publications detail press freedom violations (the Annual Report) and obstacles to the free flow of information online (the Internet Report). These are important reference books for media all over the world and for people concerned with these issues. A series of "black books" look at the situation in individual countries, such as China, Cuba, Tunisia, Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Two books of photographs are published each year, one on World Press Freedom Day (in May) and the other on Jailed Journalists Support Day (November).

Income

Self-generated funding Reporters Without Borders each year increases the share in the budget of money it raises by its own activities. In 2004 it reached 67% (up from 58% in 2003 and 53% in 2002).

This came from:

• Sale of two books of photographs in May and November (75%).
• Sale of three calendars at the end of the year (0.6%). These have been produced since 2003.
• Paid advertising in the two books of photographs (9%).

This revenue provided 85 % of self-generated funding in 2004 (80% in 2003).

• Special events: Auctions in aid of Reporters Without Borders (Star Photos, sale of designer items).
• Subscriptions to our monthly poster.

Public grants

The share of this in the total budget fell to 19% in 2004 (from 27% in 2003).

This money came from:

• French government ministries: Prime minister’s office, ministries of foreign affairs, culture and communication.
• Other public body: The Intergovernmental Agency for French-Speaking Countries.
• European Union: A project funded (until 2004) by the European Commission to defend journalists imprisoned in Asia and ACP countries.

Private donors

This budget share of this money, from French and foreign private institutions, fell slightly in 2004 to (from 12% in 2003).

Donors included:

• Private companies: Sanofi-Synthelabo, FNAC, CFAO, Beaume et Mercier, le Bon Marché, Fujifilm, Atlas publishers and the Caisse des Dépôts.
• Company foundations: La Fondation EDF.
• The media: Télérama and Cadena Ser (to fund the Annual Report on press freedom).
• French private bodies: La Fondation de France (for the Reporters Without Borders Prize).
• Foreign private bodies: The Open Society Institute (for a project to fight impunity) and the Center for Free Cuba (to help Cuban journalists in prison and their families). They provide 1.9% (the Open Society Institute) and 1.3% (the Center for Free Cuba) of our total funding.

Some partners give us help in kind:

The Reporters Without Borders books of photographs rely on a network of partners:

The NMPP and Seddif press distributors, the Relay chain and Interforum Editis distribute the books free of charge, AAP, Insert and Promap handle marketing and the Nuit de Chine agency does the layout of the books. The Fnac, Carrefour, Monoprix, Intermarché, Casino supermarkets, France Loisirs and the Internet website alapage.com also promote it to their customers.

The team of the Saatchi & Saatchi agency designs and conducts all our media campaigns.

Many media outlets make an important contribution by providing free publicity for our media campaigns all year long.