Doug Lung / 09.07.2012 02:33PM
Report Shows Rise in TV Viewing by Canadians
This week, the Canadian Radio-television and
Telecommunications Commission issued the
CRTC
Communications Monitoring Report outlining the state of the
communications industry—including broadcasting—in Canada.
In the
news
release announcing the report Jean-Pierre Blais, chairman of
the CRTC, observed that “Canadians are enthusiastic consumers of creative
content, whether it is offered on television, radio or through digital
platforms. The fact that they are spending more time watching or listening to
programming is good news for Canadian creators.”
Even with
increased use of the Internet, radio and television services seem to be holding
their audiences. According to the news release, “Despite the availability of
content on digital platforms, Canadians spent more time watching
television and listening to the radio. On a weekly basis, they watched an
average of 28.5 hours of television, up from 28 hours in 2010, and listened to
an average of 17.7 hours of radio, up from 17.6 hours the previous year.”
The
use of Internet-delivered video also increased, going from 2.4 hours in 2010 to
2.8 per week in 2011.
The report
did not show the percentage of viewers still watching TV stations off-air vs. those
viewing via cable, but it did include financial data on
“conventional television.”
CBC conventional television
showed an 11.1 percent revenue growth in 2011, as compared to 2010, along with a
14.8 percent gain between 2009 and 2010. “Private” conventional television” did
not fare quite as well, showing only 0.3 percent annual growth between 2010 and
2011 as compared with nine percent growth between 2009 and 2010.
In
addition to providing information on broadcast revenue and the number of hours
Canadians spent in watching different types of TV programming, this 240-page report
also contains a detailed analysis of radio broadcasting
programming in Canada.