The recent outbreak of stories on food safety by reporters in Beijing has ground to a halt before creating an Olympic-sized sense of panic in the lead-up to the 2008 Games.

City residents were understandably fretting earlier this month at a local television report of a street vendor in Beijing who was allegedly making buns stuffed with chemically treated cardboard, triggering a media "feeding frenzy" in which journalists rushed to cover sensational stories.

The dramatic report was declared last week to be a hoax.

 

Now that the television journalist is in police custody for committing the unpardonable sin and the station itself has apologized to the public, one local newspaper that claimed that up to half of the drinking water used in Beijing's coolers was in fact tap water is also under fire, as people have begun questioning its accuracy and fairness.

The investigative report into the bottled water market came out one day after the aforementioned television report and also caused people to panic after it was picked up by other news media. Some distributors claimed their sales of drinking water, usually in 5-gallon bottles, had slumped by 30 percent despite the hot and humid summer weather.

The government monitors have promised to investigate the bottled water market in connection with the report, and some companies are already accusing the newspaper of foul play for reporting one particular brand more favorably than others in the story.

I can only pray that the findings of the official probe will clear the newspaper journalists, who should learn the hard way about objective reporting from this experience, as their report is far from flawless, even when taken at face value.

As a resident, I also panicked, especially after the story on the cardboard-stuffed buns was found to be untrue. If news media prove to be playing on consumers' fears with such fabrications, how can I make informed decisions when it comes to such vital matters as what I eat and drink every day?

Besides issuing apologies and tokens of self-flagellation, news managers and editors should ask themselves what motivates journalists to such lapses of moral judgment.

The simple answer is that local news media are engaged in a cutthroat competition to attract readers. The journalists need to produce more exciting stories as their pay is tied to their daily performance, under a piecework wage system prevalent in local newsrooms. The journalist who fabricated the "buns" story said he did it in order to meet his news deadlines and receive better pay.

The deeper reason for the fiasco, though, may well be that journalists lack a solid and internalized sense of working ethics to guide themselves.

Traditionally, Chinese journalism schools and media organizations pay more attention to skills training in reporting, editing and writing for journalists, than moral education that may include their responsibility to readers and obligations such as objectivity, impartiality and accuracy.

For example, the Chinese ethical code for journalists, made and announced by the national journalists' association many years ago, had only academic value and was rarely diligently followed by practitioners.

Ironically, local media organizations have found it necessary to improvise a regulation that metes out possible punishments for various journalistic wrongdoings after the latest scandals came to light.

Editors and reporters on social, legal and breaking news beats, the usual culprits of sensational journalism, will also be organized to attend training classes on concepts of social responsibility and media ethics, as another remedial measure.

Although one may doubt that media ethics and morality can be taught in the form of a crash course, this is a good way for them to begin developing a personal code of conduct, which may help prevent them relapsing into old habits under the constant pressure of competition or deadlines.

Email: yuanzhou@ chinadaily.com.cn