Follow-up - Impact and Sustainability of Community Radio in Bangladesh

Follow-up 
Impact and Sustainability of Community Radio in Bangladesh
Faizul Khan Tanim does a follow-up on this exciting social media tool to find out how it is working

A Radio Revolution has started in this country and community radio (CR) is the newest tool in the block to have emerged. Experts believe that, with its immense potential, it should not only be rural centric and should not be labelled as an ‘agriculture’ or ‘development’ tool only. Rather, it should be introduced in the capital city to see bigger pictures.

And thanks to the advent of technology, CR is part of ‘alternative media’ and beyond. This is primarily because of the vast potential CR has – podcasting, amalgamating the usages of CR and social networking, transmission through mobile phone sets supporting radios which increases accessibility and the idea of sharing knowledge based resources - these will not be dreams anymore.

To get a more in-depth idea on CR sustainability, this reporter spoke to a CR station Naf owner and a CR researcher and expert who have knowledge on both South Asia and the West.

The researcher and expert is the assistant professor of ICT and Computer Science at the Asian University for Women (AUW), Chittagong, Dr Faheem Hussain, he said, “Radio has been extremely under utilized mainly due to absence of effective and localized programming content, and lack of local participation. But radio has made a strong comeback (in terms of hardware), via mobile phone sets. However, very positive steps have been taken by the government, relentless efforts of Bangladesh NGOs Network for Radio and Communication (BNNRC), its CEO AHM Bazlur Rahman and the related civil society organizations) to initiate the pilot phase”.

“For maximum success, a huge chance of technological synergy: efficiently using the cell phone based radio sets should be in practice; local programs on CR should be made interactive so that people from the base of the pyramid (BoP) can then better engage themselves with the program making and management. For this to happen, hybrid technology of Radio/Cellphone/Internet with local program should be the way to go. Young people need to be of focus here”, he added.

Hussain said more that: With proper financial management, less than 50 percent of the allotted advertisement time (sold) can ensure financial sustainability for any CR station.
Technical issues can be very crucial. CR stations need to pool their resources. Same thing for the programs.

Here is an excerpt of the interview with Hussain.

As an ICT and CR expert, what do you think of the achievements of CR here?  What is the impact on listeners so far?
We cannot/should not expect to see any tangible impact of CR so early. At least a couple of years need to go by to understand/measure any positive/negative changes in the Bangladeshi media sphere due to CR. What is more important is to preserve the baseline data (what are present status of access to information, empowerment, education, etc.). These will then help us to compare during pre/post comparative analyses.

It is said that CR cannot broadcast commercial advertisements, then what do you think might bring financial sustainability for CR?
Without commercial ads, it will be very tough for the CR stations to survive. We have seen all over the world on that there can be guidelines on the level of commercial advertisement a CR station will be allowed to air. There also can be restrictions on advertising any particular product a community deem harmful (e.g., tobacco, carbonated drinks, etc.).

If compared with abroad, what is the stance of CR in Bangladesh presently? What are the ways CR can improve, if needed at all?
A long way to go. We just started our journey. We can learn from our neighbours. Nepal is the leading country in the CR movement. Its CR stations played a major role in their fight for democracy. The people there also love their CR stations, and are deeply involved with the CR management - all very important factors to ensure sustainability.

Bangladesh needs to figure out how to manage the workforce with CR. Volunteerism has its price. There is no free lunch. The CR organizers need to understand and respect that.

Nepal’s CR stations lately were exploited by different political parties. Bangladesh cannot afford to do that.

CR is called a gift of voice to the voiceless in Bangladesh. According to you, is this a true scenario?
Ideally, yes. We need to wait and see if that practically happens for Bangladesh.

Although the effect and impact of CR in the community levels can be understood with time, the owner of a CR station Naf and executive director of Alliance for co-operation and Legal Aid Bangladesh, Teknaf (ACLAB), Syed Tarikul Islam aired mostly positive remarks.

He said, “This CR Revolution has become possible because of the government’s positive involvement and AHM Bazlur Rahman of BNNRC mainly. The impact assessment of CR will take some time but the report will be available roughly within next six months. If any assessment is done, positive things will definitely come out

Speaking about the target market and impact, Islam said “Radio Naf is for the disadvantaged people from the coastal belt. It is surely a station to give voice to the voiceless of Teknaf area and to ensure that, the programs are made of their participation. We have also made listener groups depending on age, profession and some other factors and hold positive drives, meetings and get-to-gathers to give them a feeling of ownership about this radio”.

On the usage of CR Naf, Islam said that their target is 250,000 but at this moment, 45 to 50,000 people are listening and participating with Naf and it is increasing everyday. Naf is currently making programs on agriculture, health, environment, education, calamity and risk management, climate change, local initiatives and resources, tourism, biodiversity – these are highlighted so that people are aware and become knowledgeable. And by this, their skills are developing, decision making became easy, business improved giving rise to economic development and this will definitely boost up and increase job opportunities. According to Islam, the locals are now more organized against middlemen with the increasing bargaining capacity due to access of information of potential good markets.

On a question about the content aired through Naf and listeners’ participation, Islam highlighted the factor of ownership developing. Naf is covering 80 percent of area and the Naf management is interacting with the community people and discussing on ways to develop programs in local dialect and bringing total participation. They developed strategies like on and both off air programs.

They also formed different groups of listeners, almost 20 and teaching them the significance of CR with field level e discussions organized by almost 30 of their field volunteers. To achieve maximum output, they have given free radios within the groups, distributed leaflets, posters and do campaigns of national and international days observed under their banner, for example, World Children’s Day.
Being a CR station in the coastal region, Naf airs programs to aware the fishermen, who are extremely vulnerable and also hosts episodes on other burning issues of interest like   risk management, transmitting the government activities and initiatives under social safety net to the residents so that people can take them, for example, maternity allowance, the local level government services and mainly ensures that accessing these services become easy.

Speaking about revenue generation, Islam voiced some different methods. “We can always transmit social advertisements like Vitamin A capsule campaigns. As per my best knowledge, government is thinking of commercial ads as options to make CR stations sustainable but at the same time, I do not want it to turn in to a commercial radio. At present, we are running Naf on own finance and also getting support from Unicef and BNNRC. It shouldn’t be a big problem to locate resources from the communities, for example, monetary contribution or token amounts from our members/user groups/listener clubs.

But this might create another problem. Political party heads might donate large amounts to utilize the CR station to their own benefits.

To this question, Islam replied that: the key to success is by not involving political and influential people ever - we have to be extremely alert about this. If we want to utilize this as a development tool, CR Trust Fund s can be developed which is practiced throughout the world. Apart from Trustee Funds, our ministry can help as well by arranging financial packages.

*N.B.: The Independent would like to thank for the extraction of the Tables and Images from a research paper by Faheem Hussain and R. Tongia, on “Community Radio for Development in South Asia: A Sustainability Study”, IEEE/ACM International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development ICTD2007, Bangalore, India, December 15-16, 2007, full paper published in ICTD2007Conference Proceedings.

This article was first published in The Independent's Weekend Magazine Friday June 15'2012 - http://www.theindependentdigital.com/index.php?opt=view&page=54&date=2012-06-15