Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2007-08 - Foreign Affairs Committee Contents


Memorandum from BBC World Service

BBC RUSSIAN SERVICE CHANGES

  The following plans to strengthen the BBC's Russian Service were announced by Nigel Chapman, Director BBC World Service, today.

  As the recent conflict between Russia and Georgia has shown, demand for the online and multiplatform news and current affairs offer of BBC Russian increases dramatically as Russia's relationship with the West and its neighbours become a major global story.

  This is in the context of media restrictions becoming tighter in Russia. There is demonstrably a continuing case for a strong Russian Service, which can supply audiences in Russia and the wider FSU with trusted, high quality news and current affairs programmes at key times of day on a range of platforms.

  However, the BBC faces a number of challenges in Russia, mainly around its availability as a radio service. It is available in Russian on short wave, internet and satellite and on medium wave frequencies in Moscow, St Petersburg and Ekaterinburg. Despite extensive efforts, BBC Russian is not currently available on FM—and is unlikely to be so in the foreseeable future—and audiences are under pressure. Short wave has very limited impact, satellite use of radio is low, and medium wave is restricted to the cities above.

  In this light, we are implementing a number of changes to deliver a fresher, more relevant service for audiences and to ensure that we are able to focus resources where they will have most impact.

  The major change is a greater investment in bbcrussian.com as the key method for delivery of all our content, and the strengthening of some existing areas such as news, video and interactivity on the site.

  Radio will also change, with our key news and current affairs blocks at peak audience listening times. Utro and Vecher na BBC will become longer and a new weekend edition of Vecher will be introduced. Other key programmes, such as, BBSeva, Vam Slovo and Ranniy Chas will remain.

  The key elements of the new offer will be:

RADIO

A re-focusing of BBC Russian radio resources on peak audience listening times, with more investment in flagship news and current affairs programmes

    —  Key daily radio programmes on short and medium wave will be expanded to make up a simpler schedule—focused on peak morning and evening drive time audiences—which will be easier for audiences to find.

    —  The flagship morning weekday news and current affairs programme Utro na BBC will be increased by one hour to three and a half hours each day.

    —  The existing half hour programme focusing on the FSU, Ranniy Chas, will remain, and reporting on FSU for all outlets will be strengthened.

    —  The afternoon weekday drive time news and current affairs sequence Vecher na BBC—which includes the hour long BBSeva hosted by Seva Novgorodsev—will be increased by one hour to four hours each day.

Filling a gap in the current radio schedules at weekends by increasing the availability of our in-depth news and current affairs output

    —  New weekend editions of Vecher na BBC will be launched, on both Saturday and Sunday, to take the place of current short updates. They will focus on current affairs, analysis, and culture and will incorporate many of the themes and issues currently covered by longer format programmes.

Strengthening our newsgathering

    —  We intend to develop extra newsgathering resources in Russia, resulting in increased reporting and analysis of Russian affairs in the key flagship radio programmes. We also intend to increase the current affairs reporting of British, cultural and social affairs, as well as reporting on the FSU, for all programmes and online.

ONLINE

  In Russia bbcrussian.com is having a significant impact, where it is easier to access than BBC radio services and where demand is growing. In August, at the height of the conflict between Russia and Georgia, the number of unique users increased dramatically to nearly three million.

  The audience is also accessing other platforms online—listening to audio doubled in August; demand for video jumped sixfold to nearly 2,300,000 views. Even page impressions to our mobile services, in which we are currently working without a partner, more than doubled.

  We are therefore investing in strengthening bbcrussian.com through:

    —  Launching a new online rolling news service, updated 24/7, on bbcrussian.com—the Russian market has shown a considerable appetite for this type of content.

    —  Increasing the number of high quality video reports, underpinned with original journalism from Russia, to be updated 24/7.

    —  Strengthening resources for bbcrussian.com during the morning peak periods.

    —  Increasing the resources for interactivity.

    —  Boosting the Learn English part of bbcrussian.com

  To pay for these improvements we will have to reprioritise resources from within the current Russian Service budget. This means there will be some changes to other parts of the radio output:

    —  Production of some short news bulletins outside key programme blocks—designed for Russian FM partners with whom we no longer have agreements—will end.

    —  Longer format radio "features" (non-news and current affairs) will also close, although key aspects of these—their themes and issues—will be incorporated into mainstream daily coverage.

  There will be a small impact on overall staff numbers in London; however, in Moscow there will be no overall change. We need to maintain a strong presence in the Russian capital and send out a strong signal to the Russian authorities of our long-term commitment to covering events there.

  BBC relations with the Russian authorities are stable at the moment. We have recently completed sensitive negotiations about the balance of Russian and English radio output on our MW transmitters without serious problems.

  These improvements are self-funded from within the Russian Service budget, which will continue to be the second highest after the Arabic Service in the World Service for this Spending Review period.

  We believe that a fuller multimedia news offer for audiences will strengthen the impact of the BBC's second biggest non-English language service, and that these changes will help BBC Russian become the most trusted and influential international news provider in Russia, serving audiences in the global Russian-speaking community, across all borders and platforms. BBC Russian will continue to be a distinctive public service which sits squarely within BBC World Service's core global mission.

8 October 2008





 
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