WAN-IFRA CEO Stig Kirk Ørskov urges global news organisations to join World News Day on September 28, as the annual campaign grows from 17 founding organisations in 2018 to over 1,000 publishers worldwide.
By Imran Malik | Media Industry Desk | MediaBites.com.pk
One of global journalism’s most respected voices has issued a call to action that every news organization in the world — including Pakistan’s — needs to hear and act on.
Stig Kirk Ørskov, CEO of WAN-IFRA, the World Association of News Publishers, has urged media outlets everywhere to join World News Day 2026 on September 28 — making the most powerful collective case for trusted journalism at a moment when that case has never been more urgently needed.
His message was pointed, honest, and uncomfortable in the best possible way.
“News organizations are very good at telling other people’s stories,” Ørskov wrote. “We have not always been equally good at telling our own.”
What World News Day Is — and How It Grew
World News Day began in 2018 with just 17 organizations. Last year it reached more than 1,000 publishers across 108 countries and 17 languages — one of the most remarkable growth trajectories of any global journalism initiative in recent memory.
The campaign is organized jointly by WAN-IFRA’s World Editors Forum, the Canadian Journalism Foundation, and Project Kontinuum. This year’s campaign period runs from September 25 to October 1, with September 28 as the focal day.
Participating news organizations will receive campaign materials including advertisements, op-eds, video content, and cartoons to use across their platforms during the campaign window.
Why This Year Matters More Than Ever
Ørskov’s call to action is grounded in a specific and urgent diagnosis of the current moment. He described the world as living through a polycrisis — where wars, climate change, pressure on democracy, and technological disruption overlap and reinforce one another simultaneously.
“People need more than an endless supply of information,” he said. “They need facts they can trust, context that helps them understand what is happening, and journalism that holds power to account.”
The rise of artificial intelligence makes this case even more urgent — and Ørskov made the most compelling argument about AI’s relationship to journalism that this writer has seen articulated this year.
“AI does not produce trusted information. It inherits it,” he said. “Behind every reliable answer generated by an AI chatbot, someone first had to discover the information, verify it, put it into context, and take responsibility for publishing it.”
This single observation cuts through an enormous amount of confusion about AI and journalism. AI does not replace the hard work of reporting. It depends on it. And when journalism weakens, AI-generated information degrades with it.
The Ideas Behind the Campaign
Lucinda Jordaan of WAN-IFRA has outlined a set of practical ideas for news organizations wanting to participate meaningfully in World News Day 2026.
The core approach is straightforward. Revisit your most consequential journalism. Show the impact it had. Explain to your audiences why it matters and how it was done. Make the invisible work of journalism visible — the verification, the sourcing, the editorial judgment, the responsibility that goes into every published story.
For organizations with greater capacity, the campaign offers opportunities to go further — hosting public events, creating original content about their journalism process, or launching audience engagement initiatives that strengthen the publisher-reader relationship.
MediaBites.com.pk intends to participate in World News Day 2026. We invite every Pakistani news organization — digital, print, and broadcast — to join us.
How to Join
Any news organization can register to participate in World News Day 2026 through WAN-IFRA’s World Editors Forum. The campaign period runs September 25 to October 1, 2026. Campaign materials will be provided to all registered participants.
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