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The UK Government asked for feedback from devolved administrations on TTIP
HUNDREDS of documents obtained by The Detail have provided a revealing insight into the UK Government’s monitoring of online discussion about major trade negotiations between the EU and US.
Westminster’s Department of Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) has produced detailed fortnightly reports on how the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is referenced on social media and in the press.
The Detail also reports today on how the majority of Stormont departments failed to take part in a British Government initiative to discuss the impact of major EU-US trade talks on Northern Ireland.
One of the BIS report's monitoring online TTIP discussion from the end of January 2015 stated that globally there had been 62,000 online mentions of TTIP during a two week period noting that “the key area of concern in the UK continues to be the NHS”.
Another section labelled “What can we learn from (and do about) the top shared content in the UK on Twitter?” stated that the most shared content was a video called “The Truth Behind TTIP” by the campaign group Sum of US which talked about what TTIP could mean for regulations which affect food, workers and the environment.
An example of BIS report monitoring online activity regarding TTIP. Click on image to enlarge
The report outlined how in the space of 24 hours the video had 135,000 views and 100 negative comments, with 1.7million impressions on twitter.
A separate section of the report called “measuring online sentiment” stated that an analysis of a random sample of 500 tweets showed that only 8.9% of the coverage was positive and that the “positive voices and advocates again continue to come from government and government organisations.”
The report also outlined the “top shared content in the UK on Twitter” providing details of different internet memes that were shared relating to TTIP including an image from HBO series Game of Thrones with a tag line stating “Brace yourselves TTIP negotiations are starting.
The documents were obtained from BIS as part of third party documentation released by Invest NI under FOI legislation.
See below to view some of the fortnightly media monitoring reports released to The Detail under FOI. Click on the images to enlarge them.
