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The Digital TV Broadcasting Association (Thailand) yesterday asked the government’s media reform committee to incorporate its proposal to restructure the terrestrial digital TV broadcasting industry into the committee’s media reform plan.
The association president Supap Kleekajai submitted the proposal to the committee yesterday. The media reform committee is one of 11 reform committees endorsed by the Cabinet in August to push forward reform agendas.
According to the association’s proposal, the related parties should reclaim part of the current digital TV broadcasting spectrum band in the range of 600MHz to 700MHz for reallocation to provide telecom service. The move will generate greater revenue to the state coffer.
Moreover, the related agencies should seek ways to ease regulatory burden on digital TV operators.
The independent broadcasting and telecom regulatory body, the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) auctioned 24 licences to operate 24 digital TV channels in 2013.
Later, licence holders were impacted by other broadcasting platforms, in particular social media networks such as Youtube, Facebook, which allows their users to broadcast content in way similar to TV operators but without the burden of licensing fee. 
The media agencies have also allocated more money on these social media channels at the expense of the mainstream media.
According to the proposal, if the digital TV broadcasting sector is not revamped, most of the remaining 22 digital TV channels will continue to suffer loss due to ever-declining advertising revenue.
Their financial weakness will lead to further takeovers by conglomerates until most channels are in the hands of just a few groups.