Colombia. According to the 2014 General Media Study, the public television service continues to be the medium with the highest audience of Colombians with an average audience of more than 90%.
Therefore, between 2012 and 2015, the National Television Authority, ANTV, has allocated resources to public television amounting to $490,366 million, of which 45% have been invested in programming and 37% in network strengthening, which includes the deployment of Digital Terrestrial Television, satellite segment and administration, operation and maintenance of the analog and digital network. Of this total investment, 36.5 per cent has gone to regional channels, which have recognized this support and have seen the positive results of these investments.
For the Director of the National Television Authority – ANTV, Angela María Mora Soto, "Public television needs a transformation and in that objective we are committed to working on the reformulation of public television policy in Colombia, so that it eliminates barriers to entry, establishes an egalitarian compensation regime and determines the model and size of public television and its financing."
The director also maintains that everything must be based on guiding principles of democratization of the media, access to information, right to culture, as well as the powers of the State, in relation to planning, management, adequate and efficient administration of resources, regulation, control and surveillance of the same and facilitating free access without discrimination of the inhabitants of the national territory to the Information Society.
Recently, in an interview published in the newspaper El Tiempo, the Deputy Minister of ICT, María Carolina Hoyos Turbay, assured that there are reasons for Colombians to watch more public television, and among them she particularly highlighted three: "One, they are a good option, because private channels are concentrated in the same formats and contents. Two, they create identity, as Colombians see themselves reflected, as well as their regions; and three reach the public through the new platforms, not just from the TV screen. Public channels have already been transformed into multiplatform media, with transmedia and crossmedia strategies, which give great relevance to digital content."
