All ministries need to strengthen public service announcements

PUTRAJAYA: Communications and Multimedia Ministry (KKMM) secretary-general Datuk Dr Mohd Ali Mohamad Nor says all ministries, government departments and agencies need to strengthen their public service announcements (PSAs) to enhance people's understanding in certain issues.

He said apart from providing adequate allocation for the purposes of disseminating PSAs as well as purchasing of advertising space in various media channels, due attention should also be given to the aspect of creative workforce.

In line with the development of current communication technology, people were exposed with massive information through various media channels, Mohd Ali said this in his speech when officiating the PSA Strengthening workshop here yesterday.

Hence, he said the government should also be more creative in developing interesting information and should widely use all the available channels.

“Nowadays, people prefer to read simple, compact and interesting information that is processed using various graphic and multimedia techniques.

“Such information is especially popular in social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp applications,” he said.

“The government should also be given special treatment by the private television and radio stations in the country as they are required to broadcast PSAs content for a duration of at least two minutes during one hour of transmission,” he said.

Meanwhile, Mohd Ali said the dissemination of various misleading information should be addressed efficiently to ensure that people were getting accurate, authentic and fast information via the use of simple language and interesting infographics.

“The government is putting great emphasis on effective communication strategies to disseminate information to the people in order to improve understanding on certain issues as well as to address negative perceptions of the government,” he said. - Bernama