Fairness stressed in digital TV transition
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Public interest the priority, TDRI seminar hears
The migration to digital terrestrial TV must underline free and fair competition, the Thailand Development Research Institute said yesterday.
“Fair competition is the most important and reflects real public interest,” Somkiat Tangkitvanich, president of the TDRI, said yesterday at the think tank’s seminar on “Re-thinking about frequency allocation for digital terrestrial TV broadcast: A dialogue for fair competition and public interests”.
For public TV, a beauty contest for licences should be made transparent by holding public hearings on the rules. Public TV broadcasters must apply their own code of conduct and set up a consumer complaint system. The regulator should evaluate the performance of each public TV broadcaster on a regular basis.
The rules for public TV stations in category two for public security were not clear in that the stations would be allowed by law to seek revenue that was considered sufficient for operations.
“What is ‘sufficient revenue’ in that sense?” he asked.
Natee Sukonrat, chairman of the Broadcasting Committee at the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), said he understood that this point was hazy, so his panel was studying the definition of sufficient revenue or an airtime limit for TV commercials on a public TV channel.
However, he insisted that everyone would benefit from the digital terrestrial TV era, governed by his panel.
For commercial TV channels, Somkiat said the Broadcasting Committee should revise the NBTC’s “must carry” rule as it might be quite costly for each TV broadcaster and cable and satellite TV operator.
The panel should also regulate and set standards for network leasing rates charged by major network providers for digital terrestrial TV broadcasting.
NBC president Adisak Limprungpata-nakij said he hopes that there would be no change in the key terms and conditions for the auction of digital terrestrial TV licences, as that might affect his business plan.
He pointed to the recent revision in the rules for the news category. On Monday, the Broadcasting Committee agreed to reduce the minimum airtime requirement for news programmes produced by a news station from 75 per cent to 50 per cent of its total airtime.
Though the Broadcasting Committee believes that this extra flexibility would give news stations a better chance to survive in this tough business compared with variety stations, Adisak said the auction in this news category would now become more intense.
