ENHANCING AND PROTECTING PUBLIC BROADCASTING IN THE PACIFIC
A Pacific Media Summit aimed at strengthening public boardcasting was held in Apia, Samoa 16th-18th April 2008. Senior representatives attended ffrom public interest and public service broadcasting from both radio and television, as well as representatives from civil society and print media from Pacific Island countries with no public broadcasters.
The Summit is part of a three year project led by the New Zealand Human Rights Commission (NZHRC) and the Pacific Cooperation Foundation (PCF) funded by New Zealand's International Aid and Development Agency (NZAID). The UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office's Public Diplomacy Fund also contributed to the project by bringing participants from Melanesian countries to the Summit.
The Summit explored the status of public broadcasting in the region and three general themes:
Governance, leadership and freedom or expression
Environmental rights
Children's rights and the media
These themes were identified as priorities from a needs analysis survey undertaken at the Pacific Islands News Association conference in Honiara, Solomon Islands in 2007 following a presentation to PINA members.
Summit participants included senior public broadcasters at news editor/manager level and newsroom journalists coming from Papua News Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati, Cook Islands, Samoa.
Presenters and speakers came from Papua New Guinea, Samoa, New Zealand, United Kingdom and China.
Also attending the Summit were a number of NGO's from Samoa.
The two and half day Summit developed a strong communique for continuing action to strengthen public service broadcasting in the Pacific.
The programme for the Summit follows with links to the papers given by speakers and the official communique at the end.
Wednesday 16th April 2008
Opening address by Justice Vui Clarence Nelson - Judge, Supreme Court of Samoa.
Keynote Panel - How healthy is public broadcasting in the Pacific and what needs to be done?
Peter Aitsi: General Manager, Papua New Guinea FM Ltd and member of the PNG Media Council.
Wena Harawira: Head of Department, News & Current Affairs, Maori Television.
Peter Cavanagh: Chief Executive, Radio New Zealand.
Keynote Address - The Pacific media's roles in reporting children's rights.
Afamasaga Toleafoa: National Advocate for Child Protection for UNICEF in Samoa.
Thursday 17th April 2008
Keynote Panel - Reporting on environmental rights: how does Pacific media rate and can it do better?
Alex Kirby: former Environmental Correspondent for BBC News.
Cherelle Jackson: Editor of Newsline Samoa.
Dev Nadkarni: Journalist and Website Editor of Islands Business (his paper was presented by David Vaeafe, Pacific Cooperation Foundation).
Friday 18th April 2008
The Summit Communique.
