Colombia. Within the framework of the Cartagena de Indias International Film Festival, an event that had to be suspended due to the Coronavirus alert, the Ministry of Information and Communications Technologies, MinTIC, participated in different spaces in order to show the results of the strategy of strengthening and modernizing public television, which is reflected in the 79 nominations for the India Catalina Awards.
ICT Minister Sylvia Constaín met with regional public media managers to discuss major public television projects that will have a positive impact on audiences and channels. Among the topics discussed are the cessation of analog broadcasting planned for 2022 in the country, in which Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) will be launched throughout the territory to access the content offer.
"Regional channels are a heritage of the whole country that we must preserve, strengthen and promote," said Constaín, who called for "better understanding the audiences of regional television."
It also discussed the development of multiplatform products, in which public channels have been working for some years, with the aim of reaching new audiences and taking advantage of connectivity so that the population in rural areas enjoys the programs.
The minister referred to the progress in connectivity and how this will favor the consumption of audiovisual products of national and regional public channels.
"The connectivity projects of the national government will be a tool that will facilitate access to the contents made by Colombian public television. In addition to the traditional offer that people see on their screens, these are also available on digital platforms, which allows us to reach a large part of the territory and the population that consumes information through the Internet, "said the head of the ICT portfolio.
In addition, he added that "from this year digital audiences will be measured with the purposes of knowing what their interests are, if what national and regional public channels broadcast is what they want to see or analyze what we should produce, and have knowledge about their satisfaction in terms of the quality of the productions. We want to meet their expectations and make them feel more and more affinity with public television." This project will be carried out with the support of Kantar IBOPE Media, an expert firm in the measurement of the rating of the national media.
At the end, the presentation of the series 'Libertador' was made, an audiovisual project financed by the MinTIC, thanks to the 1978 Law on the modernization of the ICT sector, and which was produced by the eight regional public channels of our country. This is a striking and completely transmedia proposal in which the channels came together to bring their audiences an unprecedented digital experience and that, of course, marks history in Colombian audiovisual production.
To this product is added 'Simona Amaya', the Bicentennial film. This production is a new proposal to present a little-known story: the role of women in the liberation campaign.
The Bicentennial project, led by the Vice Presidency of the Republic and in which MinTIC and Colombian public channels participate, is completed with a book that refers to the independence campaign, a pedagogical and informative product that gives readers an experience in which they can combine a part of fiction and drama (the series), with real data and events (the book), which gives a novel, alternative and innovative experience to Colombian productions.
This is an example of the commitment that the ICT Ministry has to promote access to public channels in our country, through the strengthening of its grills and the impulse in the creativity of producers who increasingly make better quality products and whose recognition stands out in events such as FICCI.
