The Newspaper Works announced that entries open today for the 2015 Newspaper of the Year Awards.

The awards, known as the PANPAs, recognise excellence in newspapers, photography, environment and print and production. Last year’s coveted awards attracted more than 1,000 entries.

The awards, sponsored by Norske Skog, are open to national, metropolitan, regional, rural/community newspapers in Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific Islands and Asia. This year, the awards will include submissions from Country Press Association members.

There will be six categories for this year’s Newspaper of the Year awards: Newspaper of the Year, Digital Destinations of the Year, Photography of the Year, Technical Excellence Award, Hegarty Scholarship, which recognises the management potential of young news media executives, and the Environment Award.

The awards will place greater emphasis on the quality of journalism, cross platform execution, design and the ability to record a growing audience and uses emma (Enhanced Media Metrics Australia) data.

Entries will close on July 3^rd and finalists will be announced on August 21^st.

The awards will be presented at a gala dinner on September 11^th, at the conclusion of the Future Forum newspaper industry conference, to be held at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney.

“We have some of the best newspapers in the world, a number of which were recognised at the recent INMA Awards in New York. We are expecting another record number of entries to this year’s Newspaper of the Year awards, which continue to be the pre-eminent awards in the region’s news media industry,” said The Newspaper Works CEO, Mark Hollands.

The concurrent PANPA Advertising & Marketing Awards will be announced at Zeta Bar at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney on September 10th, during the Future Forum conference.