# Writing guide: news

How to structure and write news items on undrr.org and PreventionWeb: updates, op-eds, press releases, research briefs and the other news types.

> **About this guidance:** this guide summarizes guidance maintained elsewhere, for reference. If it conflicts with the UNDRR Publications SOP or UNDRR Communications team guidance, those win; if you can't consult them, apply this guide and flag the point. [Sources](README.md#sources). Found a problem? Report it in the [Mangrove issue queue](https://github.com/PreventionWeb/undrr-mangrove/issues).

- **Applies to:** the News content type on the UNDRR Drupal platform
- **Mechanics:** spelling, capitalization, numbers, dates, abbreviations, UNDRR terminology and inclusive language follow the [Mangrove editorial manual](https://mangrove.undrr.org/llms-editorial-manual.txt) ([rendered version](https://mangrove.undrr.org/?path=/docs/contributing-editorial-manual--docs)). This guide doesn't repeat those rules.
- **Last reviewed:** 29 September 2026

Figures marked "baseline" come from 41 prominent news items analysed in December 2025. They describe what those items looked like, not rules. See [methodology](methodology.md) for how they were selected and what they can and can't tell you.

## When to use news

Use news for:

- Announcements and milestones: launches, partnerships, awards, declarations
- Outcomes of meetings and conferences, once they have taken place
- Op-eds and statements from UNDRR leadership
- Progress updates, research findings and policy developments
- Calls for proposals, nominations, surveys and other opportunities

Use another content type for:

- A report, guide or other document: [publications](publications.md)
- A meeting, webinar or training that hasn't happened yet: [events](events.md)
- A recording or materials from a past event, with nothing newsworthy to report: the [event page](events.md#after-the-event). Write news about an event only for newsworthy outcomes.
- A personal perspective from a practitioner or partner: [blogs](blogs.md)
- A job posting: vacancies

## News types

Choose one value in the **News type** field.

| News type | Use for |
|---|---|
| Update | General news stories, progress reports and initiative updates. The default. |
| Research briefs | Plain-language summaries of new research, usually from outside UNDRR |
| Press release | Official UNDRR announcements for media |
| Op Ed | Signed opinion pieces by UNDRR leadership |
| Statements and messages | Official statements, for example on a disaster or an international day |
| Feature | Longer narrative stories built around people, places or lessons |
| Opportunities | Calls for proposals, nominations, consultations and surveys |

Baseline mix: Update 59%, Op Ed 22%, Press release 10%, with the remaining types a few items each. Research briefs and Opportunities are common on PreventionWeb but did not meet the baseline selection criteria, so the baseline figures say little about them.

## Titles

Lead with the newsworthy element: who did what, or what changed. Write the title in sentence case, like every heading, with lower case after a colon unless the next word is a proper noun (see the [Mangrove editorial manual](https://mangrove.undrr.org/llms-editorial-manual.txt), section: Capitalization).

Use:

- A direct statement of subject and action: "G20 issues its first Ministerial Declaration on Disaster Risk Reduction"
- Specific actors, places and numbers
- Key terms early in the title, so they survive truncation in search results and cards
- A colon only when context genuinely helps: "Message for World Tsunami Awareness Day 2025: sustained investment in tsunami preparedness is essential"

Avoid:

- Vague openers such as "New report shows" or "Update on"
- Unexplained acronyms
- Questions, except for a genuinely thought-provoking op-ed
- Clickbait and alarmist wording

Baseline: titles averaged 82 characters (range 45–148). Aim for about 60–100 characters and treat 120 as a practical ceiling. Most titles (69%) were direct statements; 31% used a colon.

## Structure

### Opening paragraph

The first paragraph answers who, what, when, where and why in two to four sentences. A reader who stops there should still have the story.

> The Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction closed in Geneva with a Political Declaration calling for faster action on prevention and preparedness. Delegates from [number] countries reviewed progress on the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030.

Avoid delaying the news:

- A dateline followed by regional background, or a general truth ("It has become a well-known axiom that..."), before the news itself
- A first sentence that lists five or six organizations and their acronyms before the reader learns what happened

### Body

- Put the most important information first, then supporting detail (inverted pyramid).
- Keep paragraphs short: two to four sentences. Online readers scan.
- Link the story to the wider disaster risk reduction context, such as the Sendai Framework or the Sustainable Development Goals, where it helps the reader.
- Link to related publications, events and earlier news. Baseline items averaged four internal links, the most of any content type. Link text names the destination; "Learn more", "Read here" and "Find out more" don't.
- Edit partner press releases and third-party copy before republishing. Their house style (bullet summaries above the lead, "U.N.", imperial units, their own capitalization) doesn't carry over.

### Quotes

- Use one or two direct quotes for opinion, emphasis or a human voice; paraphrase facts and figures instead of quoting them.
- Attribute each quote with the speaker's full name and title on first reference, in the same paragraph as the quote rather than on a separate line.
- Don't stack long ceremonial quotes back to back, and cut wordy lead-ins such as "He further added that".
- Only quote what the person actually said or wrote. Never invent or alter a quote, including in AI-assisted drafts.

### Closing

End with what happens next, where to find more (the report, the event, the related programme) or, for press releases, the standard "About UNDRR" paragraph and media contact.

### Headings

Use headings in any item over about 600 words with distinct sections. Baseline: 69% of items used headings, averaging three per item.

- Sentence case, three to eight words
- Say something about the section: "Transboundary risks need transboundary solutions", not "Background" or "More information"
- Use H2 for main sections and H3 beneath them; don't skip levels, and give sections of the same kind the same level
- Don't leave a heading with nothing under it

### Length

Baseline: 782 words on average (range 302–1,326). About 600–900 words suits most updates; a press release or statement can be shorter, and a feature longer.

## Tone and voice

Professional and engaging: authoritative without being academic, accessible without being casual, urgent without being alarmist.

- Prefer the active voice: "UNDRR launched the initiative", not "The initiative was launched".
- Use specific details ("participants from 45 countries") instead of vague ones ("many participants").
- Cut vague qualifiers such as "very", "quite" and "somewhat", and explain or remove jargon.
- Cut promotional filler ("vibrant award ceremony", "esteemed panel", "prestigious prizes") and closing paragraphs of general uplift that add no information.
- Write news in the third person. UNDRR content does not use "we", "our" or "I" (see the [Mangrove editorial manual](https://mangrove.undrr.org/llms-editorial-manual.txt), section: UNDRR-specific terminology), and that includes invitations such as "We invite you to explore" or "We hope you join us" in unsigned news. Signed op-eds follow the same exception as guest blogs: see [first person](blogs.md#first-person).

## Guidance by news type

### Update

1. Lead: what happened, when and where
2. Context and background
3. Quotes from key stakeholders
4. Links to related documents and events
5. What happens next

### Op Ed

1. Opening that states the argument
2. Why the topic matters now
3. Two to four main points, each with evidence
4. What needs to happen

Tag the author in **Author(s)** and include a byline. An op-ed can be more persuasive in tone than an update.

### Press release

1. Clear, newsworthy headline
2. Dateline: city and date, for example "Geneva, 15 October 2026"
3. The announcement in the first paragraph
4. Details, context and quotes
5. "About UNDRR" paragraph and media contact

Spell out organization names in full on first reference.

### Research briefs

1. Lead with the key finding
2. Who did the research and where it was published
3. Three to five main findings; a list works well here
4. What the findings mean for disaster risk reduction practice
5. A link to the original research

Translate technical language for a general audience, and quote the researchers where possible.

## Metadata

See [metadata guidance](metadata.md) for how to choose themes, hazards and countries. For news in particular:

- **Themes:** two to four, most relevant first
- **Country and region:** every country the story is about; see the metadata guide for when to add the region too
- **Hazards:** only when the story is about specific hazards
- **Author(s):** required in practice for op-eds
- **Organization:** partner organizations for joint or co-branded items
- **Image:** a feature image with meaningful alt text; baseline items almost all had one
- **Short description:** one or two sentences for cards and search results, saying what the story is about

## Before and after

These are illustrative; bracketed values stand for real details.

**Title.** Before: "New Declaration Released". After: "G20 issues its first Ministerial Declaration on Disaster Risk Reduction". The actor, the action and why it's news are all in the title.

**Opening.** Before: "A recent meeting took place in Geneva where many people discussed disaster risk reduction. Various topics were covered." After: "The [meeting name] closed in Geneva on [date] with [outcome]. Delegates from [number] countries [what they did]." The after version names the event, the outcome and the scale.

**Quotes.** Before: "Officials said that disaster preparedness is important." After: a direct, attributed quote that carries a view or a commitment, followed by a paraphrased fact that puts it in context.

## Examples

Chosen from recent PreventionWeb content for what they do well. None is flawless, so each lists what an editor would still fix; the fixes teach as much as the strengths.

### [Continuity planning empowers businesses to adapt, recover, and thrive](https://www.preventionweb.net/node/95417)

Update (explainer), 27 June 2025.

**Why it works:** The opening sentence states the problem in plain words, and the next paragraph gives sourced evidence before defining the solution. Acronyms are defined on first use. The subheadings are complete claims, so a reader skimming only the headings still gets the argument. It ends by pointing readers to a UNDRR tool they can use, at a length (826 words) within the range for updates.

**An editor would still fix:** remove the serial comma from the title and lists; "Here are five noteworthy things" (listicle filler); a subject–verb agreement slip; "risk informed" without its hyphen.

> "Businesses often struggle to recover from extreme weather events and natural hazards because they are not ready."

### [The burning truth: five wildfire myths debunked](https://www.preventionweb.net/node/103827)

Update (myth-busting explainer), 12 August 2026.

**Why it works:** A strong structure for public-facing risk communication: each myth is stated, answered with evidence, then followed by a concrete fact. The headings state the correct position rather than repeating the myth, and every claim links to a source. It closes with a clear action for the reader and a link to further resources.

**An editor would still fix:** one em dash; the ordinal indicator used in place of the degree sign; "per cent" and "%" mixed; repeated "Find out more" and "Read more" link text.

> "Public discussion tends to reach for a single cause – arson, forest management, or nature simply taking its course – when the reality usually involves several factors working together. Here are five wildfire myths, tested against what the evidence actually shows."

### [Early warnings save lives: how Barbados' risk-informed decisions prevented a disaster](https://www.preventionweb.net/node/93716)

Feature, 10 April 2025.

**Why it works:** Built around one concrete decision, then widened to the historical pattern, the evidence and the policy frame (Early Warnings for All, Target G of the Sendai Framework). It draws an explicit risk communication lesson about public trust when warnings disrupt daily life. Technical acronyms are defined, and at 740 words it is a good length.

**An editor would still fix:** frequent em dashes; a United States date format ("On August 4"); "5-kilometer" in place of "5 km"; few headings for its length.

> "In August 2024, Barbadian authorities made the difficult but decisive choice to postpone a major cultural event due to a fast-developing thunderstorm threat."

### [Getting post-disaster housing recovery right](https://www.preventionweb.net/node/99307)

Op Ed, 29 December 2025.

**Why it works:** A signed op-ed that earns its first person: it opens with the author's field experience, says plainly why it is being written, then names five failure patterns, each with a fix. The descriptive, sentence-case headings ("Forgetting that no house is an island") carry the argument, and it ties back to Target B of the Sendai Framework.

**An editor would still fix:** at 1,414 words it runs well over the usual op-ed length of 700–1,000 words; "-ise" spellings.

> "In (re)building a house, the process is as important as the product. As people’s homes start taking shape, recovery becomes tangible."

### [Statement on the disaster in Nepal and China by Kamal Kishore, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction and Head of UNDRR](https://www.preventionweb.net/node/104121)

Statements and messages, 28 August 2026.

**Why it works:** A model condolence statement in three short paragraphs: sympathy, a call for solidarity, then the disaster risk reduction lesson (transboundary risk, mountain ecosystems, early warning for cascading hazards). No jargon, no promotional claims, 118 words.

**An editor would still fix:** remove the serial comma in the final list; a generic closing sentence that could point to a specific action or resource.

> "This disaster is a stark reminder of the transboundary nature of many disaster risks, the fragility of mountain ecosystems, and the challenges of early warning and early action for cascading hazards in mountainous regions."

## Checklist

- [ ] Title leads with the news, in sentence case, ideally 60–100 characters
- [ ] Opening paragraph answers who, what, when, where and why
- [ ] Short paragraphs; headings for items over about 600 words
- [ ] Quotes are real, attributed and add something a paraphrase couldn't
- [ ] Links to related content on undrr.org or PreventionWeb
- [ ] Closing says what happens next or where to find more
- [ ] News type, themes, countries and (where relevant) hazards set
- [ ] Feature image with alt text
- [ ] No "the UNDRR" and no possessive "UNDRR's": write "the mandate of UNDRR"
- [ ] Checked against the [Mangrove editorial manual](https://mangrove.undrr.org/llms-editorial-manual.txt) and the [guidance for all content types](README.md#all-content-types)