Community radio stations are in tune with the times

The number of community radio stations has risen significantly in recent years, with some already having a bigger audience than larger commercial stations. However, industry experts say it will take a while before they make significant inroads and draw advertising revenue and audiences away from commercial and public radio stations.

There are more than 200 community radio stations in SA from about 150 four years ago. The biggest is Jozi FM with more than 500,000 listeners.

The MediaShop group MD, Chris Botha, says individual community radio stations are “for now still too small to have a detrimental impact on the big radio stations.”

Community radio stations focus on a variety of issues affecting a particular community they are targeting. Botha believes that as a result they “carry massive credibility”.

They also service unique communities that advertisers might want to reach. For example, a service provider targeting a particular area might be better served using a smaller community radio station that only broadcasts in that area, instead of using a bigger station that covers the whole province.

But overall advertising revenue still remains focused on the bigger stations.

“Community radio stations we believe in the past were also underrepresented in the Radio Audience research,” says Botha.

But this has changed since 2016 when the Broadcast Research Council (BRC) provided new research showing a more accurate picture. “Now some community radio stations have audiences that are bigger than some commercial radio stations. It will be interesting to see how this impacts the advertising revenue that these stations attract,” says Botha.

BRC research director Setshwano Setshogo says on average people spent four hours and six minutes every day listening to a radio station. Moreover, 64% of the people listen to one radio station.

Like the print media industry, radio is also going through changes thanks to the adoption of digital services and products. But for radio stations, this means that they are able to attract new listeners through different platforms such as cellphones as many of them have pre-installed radio applications. Even if a phone does not have pre-installed apps, the user can download mobile apps featuring thousands of radio stations across the world.

Setshogo said 37% of radio listeners listen to radio through their cellphones. “Radio is now on the move,” she said.

According to the report, 26% of respondents tune in using their vehicle radio while 8% rely on TV and 2% on computers, which are connected to the internet, to access radio stations. A radio set is still the preferred method of accessing radio stations.

The National Community Radio Forum’s Johannes Dire says that while the industry is growing, there was lack of financial support for some stations.

He claims that the stateowned Media Development and Diversity Agency (MDDA), tasked with funding community media, has withdrawn its funding for a number of radio stations “because they were dissatisfied with the impact of community media.”

“There is no direct financial support from the government. Today is survival of the fittest, community radio is dependent mostly on airtime sales.”

The MDDA denies that it has withdrawn funding, saying that it has instead increased its financial and nonfinancial support to the industry. In its 2015-16 financial year R38m was allocated for community broadcasters as a grant and seed funding. In its 2016-17 financial year, it had approved R57m funding for 28 community broadcasters’ projects. A further 13 projects worth R19m will be submitted to the board for approval.