Facebook on Monday announced to invest $100 million to help international news outlets that are facing revenue crisis during the coronavirus pandemic.
The tech giant announced a plan in which it would invest $25 million to local news outlets and remaining $75 million will be funnelled to marketing drive aimed at news organizations internationally.
The move comes with an aim to provide financial assistance as majority of the publishers are hit by economic fallout of the pandemic. These companies are primarily dependent on advertising revenues, which has plunged these days as the advertisers are cutting back on spending in the times of coronavirus.
A Reuters report suggest that the virus could cost billions of revenue loss to advertising industry in the US only.
“At a time when journalism is needed more than ever, ad revenues are declining due to the economic impact of the virus,” Facebook said in a statement.
“If people needed more proof that local journalism is a vital public service, they’re getting it now,” Facebook added in its press release.
Facebook has pledged to do its bit to remove misinformation posted on its platform, but the pandemic itself is putting pressure on its own in such hard times.
Company’s grants are going to the publishers across the globe that is in dire need of financial support, the first round of its grant has already been sent to 50 media organisations based in the US and Canada.
Similarly, Google had previously announced that it has decided to donate $340 million in ad credits to support SMEs.