Plans to broadcast Australian television content into the Pacific is not what the region needs, an Australian media lobby group says.
Supporters of Australian Broadcasting say Australian TV content is not what the Pacific needs. Photo: Wikipedia
The government has partnered with industry body FreeTV Australia to stream 3000 hours of Australian television content into the Pacific over the next three years.
The plan was announced during last week's trip to Vanuatu and Fiji by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison.
But it has caught the ire of the group Supporters of Australian Broadcasting in Asia and the Pacific, which wants a return of the ABC's shortwave service to the Pacific.
The group's co-convener, Jemima Garrett, said by pushing TV content, Australia was ignoring calls from Pacific leaders for radio.
"Television is great, everyone loves it but it's not the most cost-effective way to communicate with people.," Ms Garrett said.
"It only gets to the urban areas and if you look at what people are asking for, it's not Home and Away and the Bachelorette," she said.
"I would like to see Pacific Island creatives funded to make dramas rather than to see Australian dramas made for an Australian audience dumped in the region,"
Former ABC head, Bruce Dover, also questioned whether commercial TV would change lives in the Pacific.
"Content produced by members of FreeTV Australia for Australian audiences is likely to be of little relevance to the people of the region," he told Guardian Australia.
"It's bad policy, it smacks of white colonialism."