The Latin American Refresher Programme organised at Porto Alegre, Brazil in February 2010 brought together young journalists from some 40 nations in Latin America. At the opening of the Refresher Programme, the UCIP Secretary General addressed the event emphasising the importance of bringing together young professionals when they are young, exposing themselves to the realities of the world, networking with their colleagues on all the continents and allowing them to exercise the noble profession of journalism in full freedom.

The Latin American network of young journalists was created in 1988 following the foundation of the International Network of Young Journalists on the world level in the year 1987. The initiators of the continental network had regularly attended the events of the world network since its beginning.

The event was organised together with the Brazilian and Latin American gathering of communicators known as Mutirao in Portuguese. The first Mutirao was co-ordinated in 1997 at Belo Horizonte in Brazil by a member of UCIP's International Network of Young Journalists; she took inspirations from UCIP’s Refresher Programmes and Summer University.

This Mutirao was also an occasion for the Latin American Bishops' Conference (CELAM), the Catholic Organisation for Communication in Latin America and the Caribbean (OCLACC) and the Brazilian National Bishops’ Conference (CNBB) to co-operate with UCIP especially in honouring media professionals of the Latin American Continent; award trophies featured the UCIP logo. The UCIP was thus naturally invited to join the CNBB secretary general and bishop for communications as well as the president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications to confer the awards on outstanding individuals and institutions in the Latin American Award evening.

The event at Porto Alegre had encouraged four Latin American nations to host future refreshers. The next two Refresher Programmes in Latin America will be held in Brazil and in Panama.

The organisers expressed their gratitude to UCIP and have requested UCIP to involve more in the conception and realisation of future Mutiraos in Brazil and Latin America for five main reasons: in order to ensure the presence of young people, to guarantee the professional dimension, to bring in professionals in the secular media, to set higher standards of ethics and values in the media and to honour individuals and institutions considering their invaluable contributions.