CBC experiencing tough challenges
THE Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) has lost more than 30 per cent of its Multi-Choice Television (MCTV) customers and that is having a negative impact on the state-owned entity’s finances.
Word of that came yesterday from Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, Christopher Sinckler, as he spoke during the debate in the Lower House, on a supplementary to approve $9.2 million for the CBC to cover various arrears, the majority of which is earmarked for the MCTV’s overseas suppliers.
Noting that the CBC does not get a subvention from Government, he said one of the major contributors to its finances is the MCTV arm, but over the last few years the Corporation has seen a reduction in its customer base with the move by the telecom companies to also provide access to overseas-based channels. As such, he suggested that the CBC as a standalone satellite channel provider is perhaps a “dying breed”, as the telecom companies expand their reach.
“…They can offer an array of services to a very sophisticated and highly demanding public who want variety, diversity, speed and those things within the packages which they are getting. On a single bundle package you can get landline, cell phone, cable TV [and] Internet; all of those things offered in one package which can be bundled and then sold at a competitive price, far below that which a single provider of any of each those services can provide. And that is where CBC has found itself caught, bearing in mind that the most efficient and successful revenue earner for CBC is Multi-Choice Television,” he said.
The CBC once had in excess of 30 000 subscribers and the figure is now down in the “low 20s”, he said. In addition to that reality, Sinckler said there are “parallel offerings” where people can download content or stream live via Internet ready set-top boxes, the same content and more, than what the Corporation offers without a monthly charge. He contended that in the context of that “pirating” and “illegal invasion of copyrighted material”, it is very difficult for the CBC to compete.
“That is really where the challenge has been coming, particularly financially as it relates to its revenue for the Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation and it is really suffering,” he stated.
Sinckler went on to explain that under the Telecommunications Act, the companies which fall under that piece of leg-islation are granted concessions when purchasing certain equipment such as the set-top boxes, but the CBC in respect of the MCTV box is not granted the same privilege. This, he said, is a matter the company has raised with his Ministry and the Prime Minister’s Office to see about correcting that financial disadvantage.
The finance minister said that the CBC is also a casualty of the changing face of advertising. He explained that the advent of new media has seen a reduction in persons utilising the traditional advertising options on the radio and television, choosing to go the cheaper route.
“Less people listen to radio to get their information, less people watch TV other than the evening news and even that, by the time the evening news comes you know everything that has happened, both true and untrue, both real and fake. So the revenue that would have come in for CBC from such sources, two of their major sources of injection are gone,” he said. (JRT)