Issue

Trade

Behind almost every product we buy and the GDP numbers we worry over, there is a story whose trail crosses the globe. Every physical product starts as raw material somewhere, from the gold in our jewelry to the shrimp at our favorite restaurants and the minerals within our mobile phones and laptops.

The rapid industrialization of countries like India, China, and Brazil and a voracious consumer culture in Europe, the United States and Japan mean ever greater demand for these raw materials—and ever greater pressures on the individuals, communities, and environments that bear the cost of providing them.

These local costs too often remain hidden. They are obscured by companies and governments that put a premium on production and exports. They are little understood by consumers, whose concept of "price" and "value" does not include damage done to people and places far away.

Trade is an effort to make those connections plain, to show the true costs of producing the commodities that have become essential to our lifestyles but that we mostly take for granted. These reports touch on goods and challenges across the globe that share a common theme: the implications of a vision of endless prosperity set against the reality of a finite planet.

Trade

The Lost Genocide

The Rohingya have been stripped of citizenship, prevented from having children, and systematically murdered. But the United Nations may never be able to prosecute the Rohingya genocide.

The Unwanted | AJ+ Docs

Follow a Rohingya Muslim family that fled rampaging Myanmar security forces and Buddhist vigilantes as they adapt to refugee life in Bangladesh.

Loretta Tofani Named Daniel Pearl Award Finalist

Loretta Tofani was awarded $2,000 by a five judge panel at the Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding International Investigative Reporting for her "American Imports, Chinese Deaths" reporting project. Formerly called the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) Award, the honor was renamed this year after Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter murdered in 2002 by Pakistani militants. Two teams of journalists were awarded $10,000 each and the title of the 2008 Daniel Pearl Award.

Round four: Winning essays

In July 2008, The Pulitzer Center partnered with Helium to produce its forth round of the Global Issues/Citizen Voices Writing contest. Contestents chose from multiple writing prompts related to international issues and Pulitzer Center reporting projects to sculp their winning essays. Read the winning essays below.

Round three: Winning essays

In June 2008, The Pulitzer Center partnered with Helium to continue its third round of the Global Issues/Citizen Voices Writing Contest. Contestants chose topics for their essays from prompts related to different Pulitzer Center reporting projects. Find their winning essays below.

How does stigma and discrimination, as witnessed in Jamaica, perpetuate the global HIV/AIDS epidemic?
Read winning essay by Glynnis Hayward

Loretta Tofani Wins Michael Kelly Award

Loretta Tofani has won the 2008 Michael Kelly Award for her series "American Imports, Chinese Deaths."

The $25,000 award "honors a writer or editor whose work exemplifies a quality that animated Michael Kelly's career: the fearless pursuit and expression of truth." (Michael Kelly Award Press Release) Tofani was chosen from over 50 journalists for 2007 work published in U.S. newspapers and magazines.

Loretta Tofani Wins Sigma Delta Chi Award for Investigative Reporting

Loretta Tofani won the 2007 Sigma Delta Chi Award for excellence in journalism for "American Imports, Chinese Deaths" published in The Salt Lake Tribune.

She won in the category of investigative reporting (circulation of 100,000 or greater). This year's winners were chosen by the Society of Professional Journalists from more than 1,000 entries of work published in 2007 in 48 categories including print, radio, television and online. The awards will be presented July 11 during the annual Sigma Delta Chi Awards banquet at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Loretta Tofani Wins IRE Gold Medal

Loretta Tofani's "American Imports, Chinese Deaths" series was awarded the 2007 Investigative Reporters and Editors' Gold Medal for medium sized newspapers.