New legislation in Mexico will require television operators to take on board ‘must offer’ and ‘must carry’ obligations, which could have a positive economic impact for non-profit broadcasters whilst improving audiences’ access to quality programming.
Newspaper Reforma reported
on Sunday that under the new law, free-to-air broadcasters would have to make
their programming available for cable operators at no cost, whilst requiring
the latter to do the same with the television signals of local terrestrial
channels.
At present, millions of households across the country in
rural and urban regions are unable to receive content from local and national
non-profit terrestrial broadcasters, due to the fact that these operators
frequently lack the resources to make their signals available across large
geographic regions or areas where reception is poor.
With the changes to the regulatory framework, audiences with
cable or satellite television would have access to the quality programming of national
channels like Canal 22 and Once TV, which
currently reach less than half of the 25 million households in the country.
At the same time, cable providers like Megacable, a metropolitan monopoly
in the city of
Guadalajara, will be expected to carry the entire programming of regional broadcasters
like Canal 7 and 44, currently excluded from Megacable’s platform.
The ‘must carry’ provision, expected to be approved this
week by Mexico’s legislators, is likely to have a positive economic impact in non-profit
broadcasters, given that potential sponsors will be lured by the possibility of
increased exposure in pay television outlets.
The regulation may also increase the programming choices of audiences
nationwide, historically limited to receive poor quality content produced by Televisa and TV Azteca, a duopoly of television networks which
together capture above 70% of total ad spending in the country.
At present, only 33% of Mexico’s 25 million households are subscribed
to pay television services, but deeper market penetration for these services is
expected for this decade, given short to mid-term prospects for vigorous economic
growth in the country and Latin America as a whole.
