02. 07. 2005

MEDIA DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY

BELGRADE, July 02, 2005 – There are currently 755 radio and TV stations in Serbia, and the first licenses for commercial TV stations with national coverage will be issued by the end of this year, said the representatives of the Serbian Broadcast Agency today. The Broadcast Development Strategy in Serbia, created by the Broadcast Agency, envisages the transformation of the Radio Television Serbia, while one of the key provisions for that is the introduction of subscription. According to the records of the Broadcast Agency, 682 radio and 212 TV programs currently broadcast on the territory of Serbia. President of the Broadcast Agency Council Nenad Cekic said that the number of licenses for regional and local coverage has not yet been established, and that the competition for national frequencies will be called for the autumn this year. “Beside RTS, five national commercial TV networks meet the technical requirements, but whether all five of them will get the license for national coverage, that’s another issue. We can divide one network into several smaller networks or we can completely split it up to local transmitters. That’s something to be estimated based on the market capacity, competition, who will apply and so on”, said Cekic. Cekic also pointed out the necessity of RTS transformation in separate broadcasting institutions of Serbia and Vojvodina, adding that this television station is envisaged to broadcast its program on two, and not three networks as it was until now. “The fundamental condition for RTS transformation is introduction of subscriptions. I know it would be very much disputed, but I have to let our citizens know that they would be much better off to pay the subscription, and to control RTS through the Council or in some other way, than to invisibly pay RTS through increased taxes, and to let the state or government in any sense to control them”, said Cekic. According to the stipulations of the Broadcast Act, a monthly subscription for RTS would be around 240 dinars (3 Euros) for home TV receivers and legal entities and 520 dinars for TV receivers in the motor vehicles.