Translated from French:
A birthday while the radio is in palliative care! 75 years ago, on May 25, 1949, it was the beginning of Radio Capodistria and Radio Koper, under the name “Radio Trieste Zona Youjava”. An anniversary, the fact remains that the medium wave stations of RTV Slo are in intensive care and that the vital forecast is still engaged.
The broadcasting unit of Slovenian RTV planned to turn off the medium wave transmitters on January 1, 2024, but broadcasting continued precariously: negotiations initiated with the management of the broadcasting units on this subject are stagnating.
Today, there are two medium wave transmitting centers operating in Slovenia.
Beli Križ, on the heights of the Piran peninsula, which allows it to cover, in addition to Slovenia, the Adriatic region and the north-east of Italy, Istria of Croatia and part of Dalmatia. This transmitting center broadcasts the following radio stations:
Radio Koper on 549 kHz with 15 kW, aimed at listeners in Primorska and Slovenes in Italy.
Radio Capodistria on 1170 kHz with 15 kW. A regional general radio station in Italian.
Nemčavci, Murska Sobota whose transmitters cover the region where the Hungarian minority in Slovenia and western Hungary lives. They broadcast the following radio stations:
Muravidéki Magyar Rádió MMR on 558 kHz with 25 kW is a regional general radio in Hungarian.
Radio Murski val on 648 kHz with 10 kW. A non-commercial regional radio station.
In all four cases, FM and DAB+ transmitters do not reach the entire national target audience and even less in neighboring countries, where both stations have many listeners. It is impossible to improve the situation in a stable manner.
If on the one hand, for broadcasts in Italian, it is possible to find a possible arrangement with Italy to broadcast in DAB+, it is much less certain for MMR in Nemčavcin,
At MMR, József Végi, director of Hungarian-language programs at RTV SLO says: “We are aware that medium wave is not the wavelength of the future. Better broadcast technologies already exist, but they still need to be perfected. “. You should know that a lot of people listen to MMR in Hungary, in Zala and Vas counties. Hungarian public radio still broadcasts on medium waves and has no intention of stopping, in order to reach the entire Hungarian-speaking population living in neighboring countries. The political situation in the country makes the long-term presence of a foreign radio station in the national DAB very uncertain.
The shutdown of the two medium wave transmitters is explained by costly maintenance (100,000 euros per year) but given the loss of listeners and the cultural and commercial losses coming from the inhabitants of the neighboring countries, it is certainly not a good deal. Politically, given the parties in power in Italy and especially in Hungary, the country has no interest in stopping or reducing its emissions. What about the international agreements on the protection of minorities that were concluded during the era of Yugoslavia?
Certainly, RTV SLO risks ending the year in the red with more than 10 million euros in losses and savings must be made, but the saving will only be 1%. In addition, the main cause of the deficit is the RTV Slovenia license fee which has not increased over time, its amount has remained blocked for 12 years. It would be time to adjust the amount instead of reducing services. So let’s wait for 100% coverage before the transmitters shut down… but that’s not tomorrow!
Michel Fremy Facebook page Radio Magazine (2024-05-25)