It was a year of major achievements and
innovation: a record-breaking audience figure;
a step change in our interactive services;
and the biggest strategic shift in priorities in
BBC World Service’s 70-year history. These
welcome developments took place against
a backdrop of ever more rapid technological
change and the emergence of powerful and
often divisive global forces. Our journalism
was both sure-footed and insightful especially
when exploring global changes, which cross
continents and unite the interest and
curiosity of our audiences.Through the
quality of our programmes – and their
impact – we enhanced our reputation as the
world’s leading international broadcaster.
The global weekly radio audience figure
reached a record 163 million listeners, an
increase of 10 million on the previous high
recorded in 2001.There were particularly
large rises in key African markets such as
Nigeria, up 3.6 million to over 23 million,
Tanzania, up 2.7 million to almost 13 million,
and Kenya, up 1.5 million to six million.
Audiences also grew significantly in Indonesia,
India and Sri Lanka, although they fell back
in Bangladesh, Egypt and Pakistan.
The audience figure includes the first
national survey in Burma, which gave us a
weekly reach of 23.1% with 7.1 million
listeners. Increased survey coverage of
Nepal, also added 2.6 million listeners.
Nepal and Burma are both countries
starved of independent media. Globally,
the short-wave total is at its highest level
for three years and still accounts for two
out of three BBC World Service listeners.
Audiences held up well in markets such as
rural Africa and India, where there is little
or no opportunity to listen to FM-quality
sound. But FM is indispensable in urban
areas, where the investment we have
made over the past five years is delivering
growing audiences amongst opinion
formers. Our programmes are now
available on FM in 150 capital cities,
up from 145 a year ago.
Success is not measured solely by the
size of our audiences. What they think
about BBC World Service matters, too.
It is particularly pleasing to see how our
programmes command the highest scores
for reputation, trust and objectivity in
most markets when compared with our
international competitors. BBC World
Service scores higher for trust than
other leading international broadcasters
in almost all our key markets. It is a similar
story for objectivity and relevance.
New media also contributed a record
performance. In March 2006 the number
of unique users of the BBC’s internationalfacing
news online sites totalled over
32 million and page impressions reached
almost 500 million. Both figures were
up more than 50% in 12 months, far
outstripping targets. Equally important was
the way BBC World Service’s interactive
programmes and online sites have become
a forum for debate between people of
many different languages and cultures.
Our investment in interactive technology
made it possible to process higher volumes
of traffic during periods of intense
international controversy, such as the row
over publication of the cartoons depicting
the Prophet Muhammad. New interactive
programmes and online sites such as
World Have Your Say and Africa Have Your Say
are becoming a first choice when people
want to take part in a global conversation
about issues and events in the news.
Online access cannot be taken for granted,
however. China still blocks many news
websites, including the BBC’s, and Iran began
blocking bbcpersian.com for the first time in
January 2006, depriving many Iranians of a
trusted source of independent information
at a time of growing international tension.
Far-Reaching Strategic Changes
The realignment of BBC World Service to
focus more extensively on audience needs
in the Middle East and the wider Islamic
world is one of the most far reaching in its
70-year history.
The strategy includes plans to launch an
Arabic television service in 2007, a crucial
step to enable us to remain successful in a
market where television is becoming the
preferred medium for news and information.
In addition, we shall be increasing investment
in our interactive services, radio distribution
via FM, in overseas news bureaux and more
effective marketing.
These new developments cannot be
funded through efficiency savings alone. In
2005, we decided to close services in ten
languages – Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech,
Greek, Hungarian, Kazakh, Polish, Slovak,
Slovene and Thai.The decision was based
on recent political and media changes in
Europe, which have lessened the need for
these European languages, and the
relatively low market impact of the Kazakh
and Thai services. But, inevitably, the
closures were very difficult, especially for
the staff directly affected.We said goodbye
to many highly professional colleagues as
these closures were implemented during
the year. I went to the Prague farewell for
the BBC Czech Service in January; the
gratitude and thanks expressed for 66
years of broadcasts made it a powerful and
moving occasion, and all of us at BBC
World Service echo those sentiments, in
relation to all the ten services.
Elsewhere, our broadcasting teams face
severe operational difficulties in a number
of countries. Reporting from Iraq and
Afghanistan remains challenging and
dangerous. Central Asia is increasingly
volatile.We had to close our Uzbek
newsgathering operation in Tashkent, and in
Tajikistan we had difficulties in renewing our
licence for FM broadcasts. In the aftermath
of the South Asian earthquake, Pakistan’s
regulators took BBC Urdu off our FM
partner stations, although part of the service
is now being rebroadcast. In Nigeria, our
largest partner is still being prevented from
broadcasting our news programmes; happily,
the audiences there have rediscovered the
value of their short-wave radios.
Editorially, the Who Runs Your World? season
on global power was the most ambitious
themed season ever undertaken by the
BBC’s Global News Division, and Fuelling the
Future tackled the major issue of energy
supplies. Together with the special coverage
of countries in the news, such as Iraq and
Afghanistan, ‘big picture’ seasons like this help
people to make sense of an increasingly
complex world. A special series, Return to
Sarajevo, presented by Allan Little, won the
Sony Gold award in the News Feature
category. It is such journalistic ambition which
makes BBC World Service stand out on the
dial in crowded radio markets.
We opened a new bureau in Jakarta,
and put in place plans to revamp our
newsgathering offices in Delhi and Islamabad.
Roadshows in the Middle East, Uganda,
Pakistan and India helped to reignite interest
in the BBC among target audiences.
Both editorially and in terms of impact,
2005/06 was a very strong year and I want
to thank all our staff and contributors for
this. But major challenges remain. It will
require skill to build on this record-breaking
performance at a time when consumer
choice is expanding in many markets, but at
different speeds. It will be vital to spot new
trends early and then make difficult choices
about investments.We also have to make
sure the values which shape our journalism
and programme making – accuracy,
impartiality and independence – continue
to shine through in all we do.
Then I believe BBC World Service will be
in a strong position to build on all these
achievements in the future.
Nigel Chapman
Director
BBC World Service
|
 |
|
|
Director's overview |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
