NEW DELHI: Advertising should be allowed in community radios (CR) as an alternative source of revenue, restricted to covering costs and investing in content, and limited to local messages and announcements.
A recent report has pointed out that considering the financial constraints felt by community radio stations, corporate organizations should also be allowed to set up and operate CR stations as part of their social responsibility activities.
While noting that the Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity has begun giving accreditation to community radio stations, the Ernst and Young Report ‘Poised for Growth: FM radio in India’ prepared for the Confederation of Indian Industry says that DAVP may be able to play a critical role in filling this gap, and even become a central hub for scheduling advertisements across CR stations, thereby making them more sustainable.
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Referring to shortage of programmes with CRS, the report says content relating to local welfare programs should be provided by All India Radio (AIR) and the local government to spread awareness of these issues.
Furthermore, Ministries can play an active role in content creation and CR stations can be effectively used to spread messages and make people aware of the government’s women’s empowerment, rural development and other welfare programnes.
The report has also made out a strong case for setting aside a portion of the day’s programming as general entertainment or music to make content aired by CR stations entertaining and informative, and build audience stickiness.
Referring to unskilled manpower in CRS, the report says AIR or media institutes need to conduct training courses to build a pool of skilled people who are competent to operate radio stations. Roll-out of Phase III of FM Radio will also require a large bank of trained professionals.
Referring to shortage of spectrum, it says that a certain quota of spectrum should be reserved for CRS.
Awareness programs need to be rolled out at the grassroots and non-government agencies’ levels to increase awareness about community radio and its modus operandi.
The report said that CR was unfortunately considered a rural phenomenon, a medium used to create and spread social awareness. However, as many as 35 out of the 136 CR stations in India operate in urban areas. It is important to understand that as a medium CR can disseminate information, develop skill sets, educate audiences and be focused on niche audiences as well. Furthermore, it can play an important role in preserving and spreading Indian culture and reach out to hitherto ‘untouched’ communities.
The government has set a target of setting up 4,000 CR stations in the future. However, this initiative can only be implemented if content, funding, manpower and licensing concerns are addressed in a manner whereby local communities are empowered to operate independently with minimum support from and reliance on the government.
It is therefore important to consider CR as an alternative distribution platform for radio to entertain, create community radio (CR) stations are essentially low power radio stations which are meant to be set up and operated by the local community. A typical CR station covers a radius of around 10-15 kilometers. It is a medium for reaching out to niche communities that are often unreached by conventional mass media. CR has a very important role in the growth of a country, especially a country as large as India, by catering to local tastes and providing a platform for dissemination of news and views that resonate within a small community, the report stresses.
Early last year, the Telecom Ministry said it was raising the spectrum fee for CR stations from Rs 19,000 to Rs 91,000., but the Information and Broadcasting Ministry had taken up the issue with the Telecom Ministry and an announcement of complete waiver of spectrum fee is expected shortly.
Meanwhile, the CR Sammellan in Delhi recently was informed that the I &B Ministry has proposed to earmark Rs One billion for development of community radio stations in the Twelfth Five Year Plan, of which Rs 900 million will be for grants or aid to help the CRS movement in the country. Thus, only Rs 100 million had been set aside for capacity building.
The Ministry hopes that at least 500 more community radio stations should become operational during the Twelfth Plan.
The Ministry has taken the initiative to promote the streamlining and simplification of Community Radio empanelment through DAVP thereby ensuring that the empanelled stations got a fair share of Government advertisements. DAVP had so far allocated around Rs 60 million in commercial advertisements to CRS. The rate of Rs one per second has been raised to Rs four per second.
While the government was willing to permit CRS to broadcast news bulletins of All India Radio as was being done in the Third Phase of FM expansion, this would need Cabinet approval. Permitting CRS to make their own news bulletins would create other difficulties.
