The most coveted journalism awards in the country - the Dubai Shopping Festival Journalism Awards will be held during the combined 11th and 12th editions of DSF under the slogan One World, One Family, One Festival.

A tribute to the role of the media in promoting the event, the DSF Journalism awards invite entries in five different categories to reward worthy media persons for their contribution in making DSF a household name. Each of the winners of the prestigious awards receive a trophy, certificate of appreciation and a cash prize of US$ 5,000.

The local and international categories are applicable to both English and Arabic publications and include separate awards for the English and Arabic Media. Participants vying for the awards may apply in any of these categories namely UAE - best two report formats, UAE - best two feature formats, GCC - best two GCC stories, DSF prolific writer (the higher number of published articles in report or feature format) and Best two international reports.

The entries to qualify for the above categories should be submitted by individual journalists or organisations along with the original clipping accompanied with an entry form. A journalist may submit up to three stories and anyone applying for more than three stories would be judged in the DSF prolific writer category. Unpublished articles will not be considered and all entries must reach DSF office by January 25, 2007. The competition regulations further specify that the entries should necessarily have the journalist's by-line. Stories with a general credit-line (by a staff reporter) will not be considered

The nominations would be evaluated by a distinguished panel of judges whose decision will be final and binding. The awards will be given on the basis of several evaluations criteria such as writing style, quality of research, quality of content, overall presentation, creativity in news angle, whether it grabs the reader's attention and overall impact of the story. The winners will be presented with the prestigious awards at the DSF closing ceremony. The winners from outside the UAE will be flown in by DSF office for the awards ceremony.

The combined edition of DSF 2006-2007 will run from December 20, 2006 to February 2, 2007. The 45 days of family fun, entertainment and shopping frenzy will offer retrospective glimpses of the 10 previous editions combining the best of the best and promises to be even bigger and better.