Annual Report 2022

2022 was dominated by the Russian

invasion of Ukraine. Covering a war is often

challenging. Did AFP manage to live up to

the challenge?

This type of global event stands at the very heart of our ge-

neral interest mission. It’s in our DNA. It’s where we show

our strength. We massively mobilised our global network,

with lots of goodwill, creative thinking, and with the

constant goal of supporting our staff on the ground. Eve-

rything was put in place very quickly, right from the start.

AFP’s Russian-speaking journalists threw themselves into

the task with great energy.

Everyone contributed in their own way to enrich the content

produced from Kyiv and Moscow by our journalists on the

ground. We should remember that it was Hong Kong who

raised the alarm at the start of the invasion. That shows

what a global event it was.

About two months before the invasion, the Global News Ma-

nagement met with the global chief editors and the Europe

chief editors to organise preparatory trips on the ground. It

is of course impossible to plan perfectly for such an event,

but we have made a lot of progress in terms of logistics and

how best to mobilise our staff Video has helped change

the culture of the Agency because by its nature it requires

much more advance preparation and organisation

We set up a large hub a kind of support base in Warsaw

Here we had staff working on logistical tasks like buying

train and plane tickets and booking hotel rooms This freed

up bureau chiefs to concentrate on editorial matters by ta

king logistical issues off their plate

The safety of our journalists on the ground is a priority For

the first time ever we hired security advisors to accompany

us in difficult areas reducing the level of risk for our teams

For a long time we have had more than 30 journalists re

porting from Ukraine at any one time In recent months we

have shored up the team by reducing the amount of mis

sions keeping special correspondents in place for longer

and strengthening our network of local stringers No one

knows how long this war will last But we have the stamina

to stay the course, while staying flexible depending on how

the situation on the ground evolves.

In 2022, has AFP done a better job of

reflecting changes in our society?

It’s a long road. We are improving every day and we need

to stay humble. These are processes we are gradually

putting in place because we have realised how much there

is to improve. Women’s rights, ethnic and religious mino-

rities, the issue of sexual identity… all these questions are

being debated and increasingly accepted. But we need to

go further and faster. For example, in 2022, we sped up

our hiring of people from a more diverse base, by offering

programmes in Paris, Asia and Africa. This is also why we

created Jessica Lopez’s position in the chief editor’s team

(see page 46). We are very active on these issues.

What did we do in 2022 to shore up our

credibility with the general public and

the media?

We continued what we have been doing for the past five

years Compared to most newsrooms in the world we

are wellequipped thanks to our Charter our sources our

network and our way of working We foresaw the dangers

posed by disinformation and we were right The results are

clear to see We have a better reputation among the gene

ral public Our slogan Facts Matter has proved its worth

In 2022 digital investigation has given even more credibi

lity to our production thanks to the integration of our fac

tchecking teams into newsrooms and the creation of a full

time disinformation reporter in Washington We consider

the issue of disinformation to be a top story for our wires

2022 has therefore been a year of great progress made in

the battle against the scourge of disinformation

How has AFP recovered from the pandemic

and is it prepared to deal with another

wave

PHIL CHETWYND

GLOBAL NEWS DIRECTOR

THE YEAR AS SEEN BY

INTERVIEW

"We made major progress in 2022 on structural reform, i.e. our

regional set-up, how desks, bureaus, and editors function."

In general we have recovered well. Getting back to normal

was one of our challenges in 2022. But it’s not over yet.

The situation remains difficult in Asia, especially in China

and Hong Kong, where the pandemic is still spreading at a

different speed than here. We’re not all moving at the same

pace. We’re back to normal here, but our teams in Hong

Kong spent 2022 locked down, in isolation. And it’s not fini-

shed yet. Nevertheless, despite the difficult conditions, we

have continued to work in China and we did a good job co-

vering the Communist Party Congress. We learned a lot du-

ring the pandemic. We are more used to hybrid working and

if the situation were to deteriorate elsewhere in the world,

we would be in a better position to deal with the challenges

thanks to procedures we put in place urgently during the

pandemic.

Did we push forward with our strategic

goals in 2022 as we said in 2021

We are continuing on this path Everything around the is

sue of hybrid work is still evolving The eight hubs in Paris

including the Planet Hub and Digital Hub were successfully

set up in 2022 at our historic HQ building We have made

great progress in covering the Future of the Planet and the

Connected World But we must go even further especial

ly on the Digital front because we are coming from a long

way back We will achieve this by creating jobs We made

major progress in 2022 on structural reform ie our regio

nal setup how desks bureaus and editors function These

systems have been in place and working in the same way

for decades The night desk that edited copy from Asia has

stopped working out of Paris Its work has been transferred

to Asia with a team of French speakers and two Spanish

speakers The chief editors team is also now working in a

different way because it is split across the time zones, wor-

king out of Washington and Hong Kong when Paris sleeps.

This editorial pivot towards a follow-the-sun system will

give us greater agility.

As for AFP News, which has just welcomed its 500th client,

our staff can now see how their efforts are bearing fruit. It is

easier to understand the logic of the event number that sys-

tematically links all our content, whether it be text, photo,

video, graphics, etc. Our clients find it easier to use AFP pro-

duction and this encourages them to renew their subscrip-

tions. The agenda has a real commercial value.

Should we continue to look to the platforms

to maintain a viable business model?

We started from scratch with the platforms. You can’t sim-

ply ignore them The whole world interacts with journalistic

content on them That is where everything is happening

Our clients need us to attract a younger audience We are

able to help them with our content

Since 2022 we have also offered our clients a stories for

mat for Instagram YouTube and Snapchat via AFP Social

Stories We offer clients more than 50 Social Stories per

week that they can publish on their networks or their we

bsites They get our best photo and video reportages from

France and the world a news roundup and short explai

ners Now we have to sell them

We urgently need to look at the latest trends in artifi

cial intelligence Its a priority The sudden appearance of

ChatGPT has shown us how quickly things can develop We

need to react flexibly creatively and productively to these

developments