The Voice of America:

Saturday moring, I watched a Voice of America newscast, delivered in Serbia, on Montena Television, one of the private television stations in Montenegro. This newscast originates from VOA studios in Washington, D.C.

VOA is a U.S. funded broadcast initiative that began in 1942 to counter Nazi/Axis newscasts during World War II. VOA continues to broadcast around the world through shortwave but increasingly, in the last 15 years, through partnerships with private radio and television stations now on the air in developing or transitional nations. VOA furnishes its affiliates with video or audio segments that can be used in locally originated newscasts and VOA is a source of training for engineers, reporters, and managers. Many of the trips I have made in recent year have been through VOA sponsored training efforts.

About the newscast---the anchor: Darko Popovic
Lead stories, based on the visuals and some words I recognize:
-Bush reaction statement to the Al Queda attempting the oil refinery bombing
-Condaleza Rice arrives for a Middle East visit
-Bombing is Israel
-Hamas march in Lebanon
-Iran nucler program…meetings
-Bird flu outbreaks in Europe
-Voice report with rolling video from Beograd (Belgrade), likely concerning Serbian General Mladic as the likelihood of his arrest.
-Nationalist rally in Belgrade??
-Slobidan Milosovic trail update from Hague
-Voice-over rolling video with references to Bosnia/Herzogovena
-Montenegro Referendum story: VOA correspondent Nebojsa Redzic reporting from Podgorica. Voice report over generic rolling video from Podgorica.
-Reader story on another aspect of the referendum
-Story on Culture. This is an extensive in-studio interview with someone from the Architecture Institute in Belgrade, Serbia but now visiting the U.S.…..w/ rolling video of old churches, some of which have clearly been refurbished as a cultural program. Others sites show buildings in need of repair. Anchor makes references to Kosovo…then cuts to soundbite of someone from Serbia making follow-up comments. Back to in-studio guest. The story runs about 8 minutes. (Personal observation: There are some beautiful churches in the Balkans, all 100+ years old. One small church I visited in Podgorica is over 500 years old.)
-Press conference story about a US/EU trade and agriculture meeting??
-Sports:
-Torino/Winter Olympics
-Celebrity story: Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen visiting somewhere??
-Quick wrap-up from anchor.

Is VOA a propaganda source or a legitimate news provider? There were some concerns during the Reagan administration and presently under the Bush administration about efforts to influence VOA content, but VOA is an important news and training provider.

As developing and transitional nations shift to free-market economies and support of human rights, free speech/free press desires have led to licensing of private radio and television stations. It isn’t enough though to simply have a license to operate. These stations must learn to sustain their operations through effective management, including the sale of advertising.

VOA news training improves not only the factual content of the newscasts but also the “look” or production value of the product. Management and sales training helps the owners/managers improve their business operations so that the program content can continue to be made available to an audience interested in local content from a source other than the government channel.

Yes, I think VOA is a good use of U.S. taxpayer funds. You can also find text, streaming audio and video on VOA’s website—including news in about 40 languages. Visit voa.gov for a look. (By the way, by law—since its creation in 1942, VOA is prohibited from broadcasting to U.S. citizens. That’s part of the safeguard to prevent VOA from being used to influence U.S. citizens.)

But what about CNN and FOX News or even BBC World--my only exclusively English language channel? (I will blog about BBC World in a few more days.) These channels are interested in low-hanging fruit: viewers who speak or understand English, which means either persons traveling from Wesern countries or wealthy viewers in diverse locations. They are commercially sponsored services--and there is NOTHING wrong with ad support for programming.

VOA or BBC World Service (BBC's radio service) are the sources for news broadcasts in local languages and their radio service is still extensive. As ubiquitous as television is in the world of Americans, radio is the leading source of news and information in true developing countries. Radio is portable....receivers are inexpensive....they run on batteries, in places where is is limited electrical service...the time and production skills needed to create radio programming are more manageable than television production.