Tag: Vatican Radio

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ALGERIA: A NEW SHORTWAVE RADIO FOR AFRICA

The ongoing conflict in Ukraine has sparked a resurgence of interest in shortwave broadcasting, as nations strategically harness this medium to serve their individual interests. As in the case of the newly founded Ifrikya FM, which operates from Algeria to sub-Saharan countries.

Radio Ifrikya FM is a station operated by the Algerian public broadcaster that addresses all African countries, particularly those in the sub-Saharan region
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While the transition to digital is being considered for FM, the war in Ukraine has shown that the ‘old’ short and medium waves are the only ones capable of bypassing the blocks that freedom of information might suffer from an authoritarian regime. By launching the signal from thousands of kilometers away, they cannot be countered except by jamming transmitted in isofrequency by the other side’s transmitters, a practice much used during the Cold War but now almost in disuse. So much so that many broadcasters, from the BBC to RFE-Radio Liberty and Vatican Radio, have dusted off old transmitters or created new transmissions aimed at crisis areas. But international services are also at the service of political propaganda, as in the case of Algerian Ifrikya FM.

The multi-ethnic editorial staff and correspondents in nine countries

The broadcaster’s website has been registered but is not yet active (as of 12 May 2023). Some social pages are active, however
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Inaugurated in Algiers on 3 May 2023, to coincide with World Press Freedom Day, Ifrikya FM was created ‘to give a voice to African listeners‘ and its slogan is ‘The African voice’. It is actually a strategy of rapprochement with the sub-Saharan area, supported by the relaunch of new air and sea lines between Algeria and Senegal, a country with which diplomatic relations have been renewed. The station broadcasts 24 hours in French, Arabic, Targui, Hausa, and Bambara and has a staff of young journalists from Algeria, Burundi, Chad, Lesotho, Mali, Cameroon, and Niger as well as a network of correspondents in nine African countries. It broadcasts on shortwave on 13790 kHz, on the AlcomSat satellite, and on FM on 105.6 MHz (Algiers/Bouzaréah, replacing Radio Coran) and 98.4 (Tamanrasset, replacing Radio Sahel, which goes off the air).

Schedule and frequency updates for the shortwave service are available through WRTH (World Radio TV Handbook) at https://wrth.info/news/.

Written by Fabrizio Carnevalini

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GLOBAL: Saturday, February 13, 2021 is the 10th World Radio Day

Saturday, February 13 is the 10th World Radio Day
Launched in 2011 to celebrate the 65th anniversary of the first broadcast of the United Nations radio, World Radio Day is now in its tenth year
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World Radio Day (WRD) was established in 2011 by Unesco member states and adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2012 as an International Day. The date of February 13 was chosen to commemorate the anniversary of the first United Nations radio broadcast, which occurred 65 years earlier in 1946. The proposal had been made the year before, in 2010, by the Spanish Academia de la radio, and the project was endorsed and supported by the major broadcasting associations, including the Arab States Broadcasting Union (ASBU), the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU), the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB), the Caribbean Broadcasting Union (CBU), the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the International Association of Broadcasting (IAB), the North American Broadcasters Association (NABA), the Organización de Telecomunicaciones Ibeoramericanas (OTI) and major international broadcasters, such as the BBC and Vatican Radio.

The function of radio

The official video can be seen here
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“Radio is a powerful medium for celebrating humanity in all its diversity and provides a platform for democratic discourse. Globally, radio remains the most widely used medium. This unique ability to reach the widest audience means that radio can shape a society’s experience of diversity, serve as an arena in which all voices can speak, be represented and heard. Radio stations should serve diverse communities by offering a wide variety of programming, viewpoints and content and reflect the diversity of audiences in their organizations and operations”.

2021 WRD is about Evolution, Innovation & Connection

Unesco provides copyright-free materials and more information about Radio Day on its website
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Broadcasters are also offered 13 ideas for organizing initiatives: talk about your evolution; open up the debate; broadcast a special program; open your doors; engage (interact with your audience); have fun!; organize a quiz; renew yourself (offer a workshop with your team around the theme “new world, new radio”); produce a radio series (a specific podcast); imagine the future; remember your “radio”.

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