The National Communications Commission on Wednesday issued a warning to China Television (CTV), saying its main channel did not meet the required number of hours for prime-time broadcasts of locally produced programs in the second half of last year, and ordered it to meet the requirements this year or face punishments.
To encourage a diversity of content and protect Taiwanese culture, the commission on Dec. 27, 2016, approved two regulations — Regulations on Terrestrial Television Business Broadcasting Domestically Produced Programs (無線電視事業播送本國自製節目管理辦法) and Regulations on Satellite Broadcasting Program Supplier Broadcasting Domestically Produced Programs (衛星頻道節目供應事業播送本國節目管理辦法), and implemented them on Jan. 8, 2017.
Based on the first regulation, TV networks have to report every six months to the commission how they meet the requirements on broadcasts of programs produced in Taiwan or by Taiwanese production teams during prime time, NCC specialist Chen Shu-ming (陳書銘) said.
The regulations require that domestically produced TV series should constitute half of the prime-time broadcasts, Chen said.
However, an examination of CTV’s program schedule from July to December last year showed that while it had broadcast a total of 262 hours of TV series, it had devoted only nine hours to locally produced shows, Chen said.
“Considering the practical needs of the broadcast industry, where professionals need time and budget to produce a TV series, we changed in November last year the annual inspection time from every six months to every year, which is to be implemented this year,” he said.
In response, CTV said that it thought the commission started implementing its new inspection requirements in July last year, which was why it aired non-locally produced programs during prime-time hours from July to December last year and planned to air more locally produced programs from January to June this year.
“The network must fulfill the new requirement in its programming this year, or it would face heavier punishments from the commission,” Chen said.
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