Fiji's New Broadcasting Service

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 785, 6 August 1954, Page 7

Fiji's New Broadcasting Service

OR most New Zealanders Fiji is one of those tropical paradises where winter never comes. Fiji, on the other hand, has frequently looked to New Zealand for its administrators and community leaders, and there are many expatriate New Zealanders in public service there. So last month; when the Colony’s mixed population of Indians, Fijians and Europeans tuned in to the first broadcasts of their brand-new radio station, VRH, it can have been no surprise to them to know that all the senior members of the Fiji Broadcasting Commission’s staff are New Zealanders, former officers of the NZBS who have succumbed to the lure of life in the tropics. But the part the NZBS played in helping to set up Fiji’s new independent, non-Governmental broadcasting ser-. vice-the only one of its kind in the colonial empire-was much greater than that. Recently the secretary of the NZBS, L. J. Greenberg, spent a month in Fiji studying conditions in Suva and the outlying islands, and it was on his report that the Fijian Government acted. Last week Mr. Greenberg told The Listener something of what had been done. "TY thought that the best system for Fiji would be one based on our own X station set-up," he said. "The service could be made self-supporting by broadcasting sponsored programmes for part of the day, leaving certain hours free for unsponsored entertainment. The second recommendation I made was that the service be tri-lingual, so that it could serve equally well the three main population groups in the islands. Most of the output is in English because all sections of the community speak and understand it to a large degree. But there are special sessions in the vernacu-

lar, and some of the commercials in the sponsored programmes are given in Fijian and Hindustani. "Before I made my report I studied the situation in Suva, consulted with Indian and Fijian leaders and did a considerable amount of field work studying reception and other problems. To give good reception in the outlying islands of the Fiji group the same programme is sent out from a shortwave transmitter as well as from a two-kilowatt transmitter on the normal broadcast band. There are also plans for a third smaller transmitter to be set up in Suva which can broadcast an English-language pro-

gramme for local residents while the main. station is broadcasting in the vernacular. "They have had a pronounced success on the commercial side, which is already not far off its financial target, without prejudice to the nonadvertising part of the programmes. A _ good deal of radio time is devoted to athletics and sporting programmes and health talks, to cater for Fiji's large youth population. All receiving sets must be licensed, and the fee is 25/-." Mr. Greenberg said that the chairman of the Fiji Broadcasting Commission, R. L. Munro, is a former New. Zealand lawyer, and brother of the New Zealand Ambassador to the United States; Mr. Li. EB Munro. Other members of the eight-man Commission, who give their services voluntarily, include Fijian and Indian representatives, and the

Fijian Director ot Education, W. $ Lewis-Jones. The staff of Broadcasting House include K. G. Collins (formerly of 1YZ), as manager, J. Patterson (formerly of 1XH), as sales representative, G. H. King (formerly of 1XH), as ‘programme organiser, W. I. McMillan (formerly of 1YZ), as senior technician, and C. B. Venning (formerly of 1XN), as chief announcer. The pioneer broadcasting station in Fiji was operated by Amalgamated Wireless (Australia) Ltd.. who ran a small station there for 19 years. AWA ‘also advised on the design and construction of the new Broadcasting House,

and provided and installed equipment for the new expanded service: The building of Broadcasting House at Suva and the installing of the necessary equipment was made possible by a grant of £30,000 by the United Kingdom Government from the Colonial Development and Welfare Funds, which covered about half the cost. In his opening address before the first broadcast last month, the Governor of Fiji, Sir Ronald Garvey, said: . "In placing full responsibility for broadcasting in the Colony in the hands of an independent Commission, with the specific provision that the chairman and a majority of its members should not be Government servants, we are breaking quite new ground. Such a system. is the first of its kind in the Colonies, and our experiment is being watched with interest in London and elsewhere in the Commonwealth."

The chairman, R. L. Munro, thanked all those who had helped to found the service. "While the BBC and the ABC have given us considerable assistance, for which we are deeply grateful," he said, "the NZBS has been so overwhelmingly generous that we can never hope to repay it. Its director, Mr. William Yates, and its secretary, Mr. L. J. Greenberg, who in March and April literally laid the foundation for our service, has given us incalculable assistance, including the secondment from their service of nearly all our considerable staff. It shall be our constant endeavour to play our part in maintain~ing the great goodwill which exists between the Dominion and this Colony, and in particular to merit the esteem of the NZBS." (The Fiji Broadcasting Commission’s stations are VRH and VRH4. Station VRH, with two kilowatts of power, operates on a frequency of 930 kilocycles or 322.6 metres. Station. YRH4, the shortwave transmitter, has a power of 500 watts and operates on a frequency of 3980 kilocycles or 75 metres.)