Business Daily (Nairobi)
Kui Kinyanjui
19 February 2008
The Government has announced plans to promote locally produced TV programmes in the post-analogue broadcasting era, signalling a possible rise in business opportunities for producers.
The State has formed a task force to advise on how the country could tap talent to increase the volume of local content on television when the industry makes the transition into digital broadcasting in 2012, Information minister Samuel Poghisio said.
"Kenyan voices are absent in the current analog format. We are convinced that relevant local content is going to be a big driver of the uptake of digital broadcasting services," he said.
Kenya is among other countries that have committed themselves to meeting an International Telecommunications Union directive switch to digital broadcasting by 2015. The transition will see mainstream terrestrial stations such as NTV, KBC and KTN transform their broadcasting modules to digital transmission.
Digital broadcasting offers consumers enhanced services besides offering each broadcaster a maximum of eight channels instead of one.
Mr Poghisio spoke during the launch of an 11-man Digital Television Committee (DTC) expected to manage the transition in the next four years. It is estimated that more than 98 per cent of television owners will have to either buy a set top box or a new digital television.
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