Australia’s Channel 9 woos

trade winds

Australia’s Channel 9 woos islands with TV offers

A major Australian tele vision network is wooing a number of Pacific island nations, seeking to weld them into an international broadcast network using a leased satellite to pro vide them with news, sports and entertainment in return for access to their advertising dol lars.

The Nine Network, operated by Publishing and Broadcas ting, Ltd., of Sydney has been invited by Fiji, Tonga and the Cook Islands, so far, to conduct feasibility studies into the intro duction of broadcast television to their territories, with particu lar reference to the rural areas.

Channel Nine suggests that by use of its satellite it could provide service of an internatio nal character at about one tenth the cost of other methods of transmission.

The offer is, in fact, a spin-off from the Nine Network’s ex isting full-time-leased satellite link from Los Angeles to Syd ney through which it feeds its Australian stations. The prog rams are going overhead of the Pacific, anyway. It would be easy, and relatively cheap, to install virtually automatic, off the-shelf, small earth stations to pull the signals down to the Pacific countries and re-trans mit them for local consumption.

Channel Nine executives say they would simply make the programs available in either recorded, or live, form. Local decisions could be taken on which were re-broadcast, and when.

Almost all Pacific islands now have plenty of television sets, all currently served by video recor ders and an elaborate system of cassette program renting. Prog rams are mostly pirated from

Australian, New Zealand and American broadcast television and rental rates are very low compared with, say, Australia.

In Fiji, where perhaps the most elaborate system has grown up, a three-hour cassette may be hired for as little as Fsoc per night.

The video epidemic has come under considerable critic ism from some quarters be cause many popular programs are regarded as too violent, too sexy, or otherwise unsuitable for island consumption.

Church groups in many is lands have criticised what they see as a cultural drug, set to destroy local traditions and values. Politicians have voiced similar worries, although they themselves have been accused of being more interested in local television for the chance it would give them to promote themselves before the voters.

So far, however, and with the notable exception of Papua New Guinea which has already announced establishment of lo cal broadcast television in association with a Newcastle, Australia, broadcaster, Pacific countries have avoided tempta tion, saying it is too expensive for them.

But, the fact is that television has arrived anyway, through video recorders and, in most cases, the most popular prog rams are culturally the worst.

Even quite remote villages now have their highly-prized video recorders run off small, port able, electrical generators.

Several governments, including Fiji’s, are now worried about the ill-effects of many of the shows. There is no real censor ing of tapes and the list of what is available in crime, violence, sex and stupidity, in the multi-

tude of mostly Indian-operated shops in Fiji, is pretty well endless.

Some governments, con sidering the Channel Nine offer, think that it would give them a chance to control television choice and consumption.

The other factor, less signifi cant, but still there, is that many of the pirated tapes carry news and documentary programs which have served mostly to reinforce islanders’ feeling that they are being left behind and isolated from the world’s in formation revolution. They would like to have international news and sports reporting as it happens, not a week or more later.

Channel Nine’s vice-presi dent and technical director, Mr Paget Blackburn, has travelled through the main Pacific islands carrying out field inspections and discussing funding and support for the proposed services. He says he has been well received everywhere.

Speaking in Suva, he said his study would be most compre hensive. Technical aspects examined would include re

quirements for studios, trans mitters, and antenna towers, as well as earth stations. He was also looking at funding arrange ments for both capital and operating costs, local program ming, staffing and training.

He said that as things looked currently Channel Nine was offering to take charge of the delivery of the programs, and participate in management of the stations. Individual govern ments would have overall con trol of program content and operate their own transmitters.

If all the island countries approached accepted the offer, then individual cost would be reduced because some services provided by the Australian company would be common to all.

Mr Blackburn said his report would be ready in June. If governments accept it, broad casting could probably begin in about a year from the date of acceptance.

Capital cost would vary from country to country, he said, because of the widely-different geographical make-up of the islands. In Fiji they would be

Logo of TCN Channel Nine Pty Ltd, Sydney. Selling to the Pacific.

aiming to cover between 60 and 70 per cent of the country, which was probably all that was viable because of the terrain and scattered nature of the islands. In Tonga, however, it should be possible to reach 85 per cent of the population.

He emphasised that Channel Nine had been invited to the islands and was itself paying totally for the feasibility study.

Staff Writer.

Longer

runway

planned for

Faleolo

Extensions to the runway at Apia’s Faleolo airport, the in ternational gateway for Western Samoa, are now expected to be completed by the end of June this year, according to the latest engineering report. The prime minister, Tofilau Eti Alesana, said the extensions were of vital importance to the country which was now looking to in crease its income from tourism.

The development of the air port will allow services by larger aircraft than the Boeing 737 twin-jets which have so far been used by Polynesian Airlines and other airlines coming to the country, and open the way for larger tour groups, more air freight each way, and better economics. The extensions will go hand in hand, said the prime minister, with the encourage ment of overseas investment in local tourist resorts such as hotels. He also said that these projects were emphasised in Western Samoa’s fifth deve lopment plan, starting this year.

Immediate tourism goals in clude the legislation passed at the last sitting of parliament allowing the building of a 540room international hotel by the Royal Samoan Hotel Corpora tion Ltd. Construction of the hotel is expected to begin by March 31, 1986. If work does not begin by that date the concessions will be revoked by Cabinet.

Tofilau Eti said that legisla tion should be introduced to protect Samoan culture and heritage, but much of the pro tection would ultimately rest with Samoans themselves.—

Lee Anderson.