TOPPING MEDIA LITERACY INDEX
Finland is often held up as the benchmark for having a media literate population.
The country has topped the Media Literacy Index every year since the ranking system was first published in 2017.
The index compares 47 countries on factors such as education, media freedom, and the ability to resist disinformation.
To equip students with the skills to combat misinformation, schools across Finland are given the latest book, “The ABC Book of Media Literacy”, to teach the subject.
Information literacy expert Susanna Ahonen, one of the driving forces behind the book, believes it is “in the Finnish DNA” to have an open and transparent media.
“We are neighbours of Russia, and we know how the information environment in Russia is,” said Ms Susanna Ahonen, information literacy project manager at News Media Finland, a trade association of newspapers in the country.
“During the Cold War, people didn’t get any information. Nowadays they are flooded with information,” she added. “But the point is always the same, that if the people don’t know what’s really happening, you can do whatever you want. And to protect democracy, we have to fight that always.”
