OTTAWA – While CRTC chairman Charles Dalfen said little to surprise independent producers in his annual address at the CFTPA’s national conference, he did hint at something that could delight them.
With CBC up for licence renewal this year, followed by the major private ‘casters, and with handheld digital media starting to shift industry revenue streams, Dalfen told producers “a bigger TV policy review might be timely” and he’s welcoming suggestions.
Any re-think of the TV policy, cursed by almost all stakeholders except broadcasters since it took effect in the fall of 2000, would begin after the review of the commercial radio policy, set to begin May 15.
A TV review comes at a time when the CFTPA’s state-of-the-industry economic report, Profile 2006, says total Canadian production volume was down in 2004-05 by 9%, to $4.5 billion, signalling “that a downward trend is beginning.” For the third straight year, the film and TV industry employed fewer people, with a decline of 11% in 04-05 compared with the previous year.
Over the same period, although demand for content has become greater than ever, the report says this increase has “not been balanced by an increase in broadcaster contributions or indeed in public sector subsidy dollars.”
For broadcasters, by contrast, “the outlook is robust – even on the production front.” Profile reports that “broadcaster in-house production was the fastest growing sector in 2004-2005, increasing by 5% to $1.09 billion and accounting for 24% of total production activity in the nation. While broadcasters increased their spending on Canadian independent production by $35 million between 2003 and 2004, 80% of that increase was directed to programming for specialty services.”
Dalfen says some changes since 2000 have benefited indie producers. These include the drama incentive program introduced in 2004, in which broadcasters can earn more advertising minutes by broadcasting more hours of original English-language Canadian drama, spending more on it, and attracting more viewers to it. He says preliminary data shows increased viewing for Canadian drama “on all of the major private networks following the introduction of the incentives,” but it’s too early to “draw conclusions about the impact.”
And on HD, Dalfen says the gap is widening between the demand in Canada for HD programming and the supply.
“HD TV sets are becoming increasingly common in Canadian homes. Data from one major manufacturer show that sales revenue in Canada of their HD sets went from virtually nil in late 2003 to more than one-quarter of total revenue from sales of all TV sets over 30 inches by the end of last year.
“But while a rapidly increasing number of Canadians own HD TVs, most of the programming that they can watch in HD is produced in the US. The situation we all want to avoid is one where Canadians opt out of Canadian content if the HD programs they want to see are coming from somewhere else.”
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Notes on Bev Oda as new Heritage Minister… From Alex Raffe, producer and former head of the Ontario Film Development Corporation: “A number of us are heartened by her appointment, impressed by her comprehension of our industry. I don’t think we’re fearful in the short term, but if they had a majority….”
Regarding the Tories’ hints that film & TV producers should get more funding from private sources, Triptych Media producer Robin Cass says, “we’ve an opportunity for a whole new dialogue. We have a home in culture (rather than Industry [ministry]). We’re very good at playing with others, co-venturing and getting things done.”
