[cma-l] Community Media's Role in Europe

[Jaqui Devereux]

PRESS RELEASE

Release date: 4th June 2008
For immediate release


Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE) welcomes the report of the European
Parliament Committee on Culture on Community Media?s role in Europe

The Community Media Forum Europe (CMFE) welcomes the vote on the report
promoted by Karin Resetarits (Member of the European Parliament,
Austria, Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe ?ALDE), which
calls on the European Union to encourage alternative media in Europe in
order to promote pluralism and cultural diversity, adopted by the
European Parliament?s Committee on Culture and Education on 2nd June 2008.

"Alternative media does not result in isolating people, on the contrary
they allow a community to integrate, informing them of their rights,
especially in the area of education and access to public services but
also promotes citizens to take part in active life and listens to their
problems and concerns. This type of media is a community tool and serves
as a cultural and social integration project", says Karin Resetarits.

The support measures recommended by Mrs Resetarits are mostly of a
technical nature, legal (attribution of frequencies) and financial
(possible financing by the EU and member states). "I hope that when the
European Commission publishes in 2009 their Communication on the
indicators of pluralism in the media, it will take into account our
proposals on alternative and community media which obviously contributes
and promotes pluralism", concluded Mrs Resetarits.

?This initiative is of great importance to our sector and helps gaining
more acknowledgement for the thousands of CM around Europe and hundreds
of thousands active citizens participating in these media projects.?
said Pieter de Wit, president of CMFE, in a first comment.

For any further information, please contact:
Pieter de Wit, President CMFE, Tel:  + 31 24 361222, Mobile+ 31 6
53678990 or
Helmut Peissl, CMFE Board member, Tel: + 43 4238 8705, Mobile: + 43 650
49 48 773


Voting in the European Parliament plenary session is expected to take
place in September 2008.

The English version of the draft report (without the adopted amendments)
can be found at
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+COMPARL+PE-402.919+01+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN 

<http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//NONSGML+COMPARL+PE-402.919+01+DOC+PDF+V0//EN&language=EN>
The report builds the KEA-study on ?The state of Community Media in the
European Union?, September 2007 (available at
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/activities/committees/studies/download.do?file=17791)

* CMFE (Community Media Forum Europe) is a network of policy experts,
organisations and federations which aim to support the role of Community
Media on the European level.
* OLON is the "Organisatie van Lokale Omroepen in Nederland", or in
English: "Dutch Federation of Local Public Broadcasting Organisations?

CMFE website: www.cmfe.eu

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


--
Salvatore Scifo,
Lecturer in Community Media
Media Information & Communication
Department of Applied Social Sciences
London Metropolitan University
Ladbroke House, Room LH 326
62-66 Highbury Grove
London N5 2AD

W: www.communitymedia.eu
-- 
Jaqui Devereux

Director
Community Media Association

15 Paternoster Row
Sheffield
S1 2BX

+44 114 279 5219


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