A single commercial broadcaster pocketed €23 million in European Union journalism funding between 2021 and 2026, operating without any consortium partners. That figure nearly equals half of what went to every local media outfit, community newsroom, and media NGO combined across the same period. The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) crunched those numbers as EU institutions negotiate the bloc’s next seven-year budget.
Funding for journalism now claims a seat at the table for the first time. The EU’s news media sector pulls in roughly €77 billion annually and employs over 700,000 people. Yet it shed 57,000 jobs from 2021 to 2023 alone. Meanwhile, a 97-country study linked declining press freedom to a 1 to 2 percent drop in real GDP growth.
The EFJ mapped €288.1 million scattered across four separate programs and three agencies. None listed journalism sustainability as their core mission. The largest thematic chunk, €70.6 million, went to Creative Europe’s journalism partnerships. Disinformation projects trailed close behind at €59.2 million.
As a result, the EU spends nearly as much studying threats to journalism as it does paying for actual reporting. Furthermore, for every euro invested in local independent journalism and cross-border investigations, about €1.20 flows into disinformation work.
The structural cracks run deeper. Nearly every EU journalism grant lasts 12 to 24 months. However, news startups typically collapse within three to five years, almost always for commercial reasons. Only two projects worth €3.4 million across five years focused on building new revenue models.
Meanwhile, Sweden’s press support system has operated for over 50 years. France offers multi-year structural subsidies. The EU has no equivalent mechanism.
Western European organizations dominate project coordination too. Belgium, France, Germany, and the Netherlands control more than 55 percent of coordinator budgets, even as funding targets Eastern and Central Europe.
EFJ President Maja Sever demanded 20 percent of AgoraEU, the proposed new culture and journalism program, be ring-fenced for independent media. She also called for longer grant cycles and access mechanisms that a two-person local newsroom can actually navigate.
Negotiations on the 2028-2032 budget give policymakers their first real opportunity to build funding that reaches the newsrooms most at risk.
