In 2022 EFE won 32 awards and gained several mentions.

The last award received in 2022, just "days" before the end of the year, was granted by the Vive la Magia Festival, the most important one held in Europe, to Carmen Naranjo from our Culture section for the "priceless work" done by EFE in the spreading of culture in all its formats. Naranjo was awarded the Frank Mery prize.

It all began in January when our colleague Pilar Salas, a gastronomy specialist, received the Special Journalist Award from the Excelencias 2022 Group, for her journalistic pieces devoted to spreading the values of Spanish and Ibero-American cuisine.

The Spanish chef Karlos Argiñano; Luis Abadiner, President of the Dominican Republic, and NH Hotel Group, were also awarded, among others.

A month later, EFE Verde (EFE environmental unit) and the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet), and others, were awarded the 2021 medal of Civil Protection, which recognizes the protection of people, property and collaboration in emergency situations.

The award was received by its director Arturo Larena, who received the award from the Secretary General of Spains Penitentiary Institutions, Ángel Luis Ortiz.

Also in February, the Economy editor Alina Dlugoborska was honored with the Career Achievement Award in the 12th edition of the journalistic awards Juan de la Cierva y Hoces, with which the specialized publication AviaciónDigital recognizes the best articles on the aviation sector.

The jury decided unanimously to grant the award to our colleague for her recognized work in aviation and tourism information.

At the end of February a photograph published by EFE on July 2021 of the Montgrí mount fire was the winner of the Carles Rahola Awards. Its author was David Borrat, who collaborates with EFE in the Gerona (northeast of Spain) area. The image shows a helicopter helping to extinguish the fire in front of a huge cloud of smoke. The jury considered that the picture is a "vivid image of natural disasters and makes evident the scant dimension of the human being before the magnitude of nature." It also values the "plasticity of the image."

In March 2022, the Efeminista (gender equality and feminism unity at EFE) team, led by journalists Macarena Baena and Carmen Sigüenza, received the award from the Association of Women Artists "Blanco, Negro y Magenta" for Best Media Outlet 2022.The award recognized the work of EFE "in favor of art" and the "highlighting of women" carried out by Efeminista.

On March 23rd Pilar Salas was once again recognized for her work. This time it was the Association of Chefs and Pastry Chefs of Madrid (Acyre) that awarded her for Best Gastronomic Journalist at the 49th edition of its annual awards.

The following month, the Oncological Pediatric Association of Madrid (ASION, in Spanish), awarded two reports on stress caused by the confinement due to the COVID pandemic in pediatric oncology units and palliative care in children with incurable diseases. They were written by Begoña Fernández, a journalist from the National Department of EFE. For ASION, through her pieces, Fernandez made pediatric cancer visible "with accuracy and sensitivity", according to the jury.

It was in May when the head of EFE news desk in Brussels (Belgium), Catalina Guerrero, received the 28th Salvador de Madariaga European Journalism Award, granted by the Association of European Journalists, the Representation in Spain of the European Commission and the Madrid Office of the European Parliament. The prize, awarded in the category of Written Press, recognizes her "long trajectory of tireless reporting on European current affairs in all its different angles, always with accuracy and objectivity and with the proud anonymity typical of news agencies."

Also in May, EFE received the award to the best digital transformation project of the European Stars4Media program for working on the development of an artificial intelligence model for video applied to the processes of cataloging, identification and distribution of media content.

On May 25 EFE Guatemalan photojournalist Esteban Biba won the London Photography Awards, in the category of "Editorial Photography-Environmental", for his image "Rezar" ("Praying"), taken in May 2021 in front of the Pacaya volcano (Guatemala). This picture shows a woman holding a wooden cross with the erupting volcano in the background.

At the end of May, Mexican EFE photojournalist Sáshenka Gutiérrez won the Ortega y Gasset Prize for the photography of Sandra Monroy, a young woman who had undergone a double mastectomy, while being cared for by her mother and a friend. The winning image, according to the jury, captures a moment of maximum pain, "in which the wound is still fresh and yet manages to convey hope."

On the last day of May, Mexican cartoonist and illustrator Víctor Solís, a contributor to EFE Verde.com of EFE, won second place in the World Press Cartoon in the "Gag Cartoon" category, for an environmental illustration published in the efeverde.com blogosphere.

In June, after a prolific month of May, the team of EFE´s news desk in El Salvador -photographer Rodrigo Sura, cameraman Francisco Vladimir Chicas, and journalists Hugo Sánchez and Sara Acosta-, was recognized by the Citizens' Group for the Decriminalization of Abortion of the Central American country. The team, led by journalist Sabela Bello, documented, for at least seven years, the moments when women released by commutation of sentence or acquitted of charges, left prison and reunited with their families to rebuild their lives.

On July 12th, EFE received the MEDES award for the best institution, granted by the Lilly Foundation, for the promotion of Spanish in medical and scientific knowledge. The jury recognized EFEs long history of disseminating science and culture, and highlighted the work carried out with the creation of relevant initiatives such as FundéuRAE, EFEsalud and its science unit.

In August, the Interamerican Press Asssociation announced the award for the best news coverage of the year to EFE´s news desk in the Canary Islands for its work on the eruption of the volcano in La Palma island.

On September 27th, Esteban Biba won first prize in the "Main News" category of the Andréi Stenin International Photojournalism Contest in Russia. This edition gathered more than 3,000 works from 54 countries.

On September 29th, the European Alliance of News Agencies (EANA) awarded EFE's news podcasts for their "quality" and "innovation". EFE's short news podcasts, produced by Esmeralda Antona, Marta Alonso, Pablo Gómez, Verónica López and Iskra Calderon, together with technicians Esteban Novillo, Paco Minayo, Pilar Lloret and Marina Ruiz, from the Audiovisual Department, are distributed daily on the main audio platforms -Spotify, Amazon Music, ITunes and Google, among others.

On October 13th, EFE Agro (the news agency specializing in the agricultural sector), was awarded the first Excellency Award for Innovation by Rural Women, in the Communication category, for "its specialized news service in the food sector and rural territory; as well as its professionals."

A day earlier, as Best Photography, the Alliance of Mediterranean News Agencies (AMAN) awarded an image by photojournalist Miguel Calero of the eruption of the volcano in La Palma island, taken on November 19, 2021.

On October 18th, the Association of Journalists of Navarra recognized Rodrigo Jiménez with the "Teobaldo- News Picture" for an image entitled "La niña del globo rojo" (The girl and the red balloon), taken on March 9th at the Cracovia (Poland) train station, where dozens of Ukrainians had arrived.

Three days later, EFE was recognized for its pioneering work in environmental information at the 1st Environmental Forum of the Turkish News Agency Anadolu, held in Istanbul. The award was presented by the First Lady of Turkey, Emine Erdogan, to Arturo Larena, Director of Environment and Science of EFE and EFE Verde.

On November 3rd, 2022, Efeminista was awarded the Progressive Women 2022 Award in the media category, granted by the Federation of Progressive Women. It recognized their "commitment to making awareness of the discrimination suffered by women around the world and for defending their rights, their empowerment and their participation in different areas."

The following day, EFE´s journalist Lourdes Velasco was granted the 1st Journalistic Prize of the Spanish Nephrology Society for her report "Así es vivir pegado a una máquina" ("How to live connected to a machine") for the informative rigour of the piece and the "accurate, close and empathic treatment of renal health."

On November 16th, the Association of Information Media (AMI) awarded numerous special envoys of the Spanish media to Ukraine, among them 19 from EFE, for their "indispensable work".

Furthermore on November 21st, Macarena Baena, the head of EFE's gender equality website, Efeminista, was honored by the Spanish Ministry of Equality, for her professional career against male violence and her work in spreading correct data on social media of violence against women. On the 25th of that month, Efeminista was, once again, awarded the journalism and communication prize of the Club Abierto de Editores (CLABE) in the category of solidarity. It recognized its "truthful information for equality, with the aim of empowering women and achieving their participation in all areas."

On November 30th, journalist Mercedes Salas was awarded by the Spanish Fishing Confederation (Cepesca, in spanish) for the best article on fishing and for her work "Captain Otero claims from the North Pole, the vaccine for fishermen." An interview with the captain of a cod fishing boat in the Arctic Circle that spread the fishermen's claim to prioritize their vaccination against COVID 19 after a year of pandemic. The jury considered that Salas brought to the forefront the oblivion of forgetfulness associated to the essential nature of fishermen´s activity.

The photojournalist Adra Pallón was one of the winners in the Injuve Awards for Journalism and Communication 2022, for his news coverage for EFE of the forest fires in Galicia in September 2022.

In December the photographer Daniel Pérez, was recognized with the Andalusia Journalism Awards 2022 for his work of the fire in Alhaurín (Málaga). The jury highlighted the difficulty of the moment of his photographic capture, its technical quality and the horror of the natural tragedy.

EFE Salud journalist Nerea Díaz was awarded the SEC-FEC Journalism Prize by the Spanish Society of Cardiology (SEC) and the Spanish Heart Foundation (FEC) for her work "Vascular risk units for the control and prevention of cardiovascular diseases".

On December 22nd, EFE's correspondent in Bulgaria, Vladislav Punchev, was awarded the Samuel Francés Prize, for professional and civil ethics in the category "Online Print Editions", by the Association of Spanish-speaking Journalists in Bulgaria.