GFMD at ARIJ Forum 2025

GFMD’s 20th Anniversary at the ARIJ Forum - Amman, Jordan

GFMD was founded at a meeting in 2005 in Amman, Jordan. This year, we will be marking the 20-year anniversaries of both GFMD and ARIJ at the 18th Annual ARIJ Forum.

GFMD’s Deputy Director, Tom Law, will be participating in the following meetings:

Saturday, 6 December:

• Regional meeting of members hosted by GFMD’s Steering Committee members from the MENA region: Rawan Damen (ARIJ) and Shireen Al Khatib (MADA Palestine)

• EED Side Event: Evolving Support for the Resilience and Scalability of Independent Media

• Meeting of publishers from the region

Sunday, 7 December:

MENA donor coordination meeting

Agenda

Time (Aman time)	Session	Speakers / Moderators
10:00–10:03	Welcome & Opening	Dr Zahera Harb (ARIJ)
10:03–10:30	US Funding: Legal Updates + Q&A	Speaker: Alexander Papachristou (Vance Center) Moderator: Tom Law
10:30–11:15	Sustainable Funding: MENA Strategies • Summary of recent sector events • Interactive discussion on funding priorities & donor shifts	Moderator: Tom Law (GFMD)
11:15–11:25	Coffee Break
11:25–11:50	Sustainable Funding (cont.) • Collective advocacy • EU MFF overview & Media Support Toolkit • Development bank engagement
11:50–12:40	Impact Assessment & Donor Engagement • Current challenges • Agile tools & collaboration • Coordinated impact dissemination	Moderator: David Hivet (SahafaMed)
12:40–12:45	Closing Remarks	Rawan Damen (ARIJ)

Jesper Hojberg, Executive Director of IMS, one of the founding members of GFMD, will speak about the anniversary at the ARIJ awards on Sunday evening.

For literature review on journalism support and media development see resources and literature review here.