Implementation of the Brazilian System of Terrestrial Digital TV
The Brazilian government regulated, in 2015, Decree Nº 5820 of June 29, 2006, providing over the implementation of the Brazilian System of Terrestrial Digital TV. This Decree instituted the creation of four new public channels (not state-based), including: (i) The Executive Power Channel – to broadcast meetings, works, projects, sessions and events of the Executive Power; (ii) The Education Channel – for broadcasting education content for the development and improvement, among others, of distance education for students and teacher training; (iii) The Civic Channel – to broadcast content made by local communities, as well as for the publicization of acts, works, projects, sessions and events of the state and municipal public authorities; (iv) The Culture Channel – to proadcast cultural productions and regional content, recognizing and appreciating the Brazilian cultural, ethnic and regional diversity, disseminating artistic output and cultural assets.
Among the channels of the Executive Power, the Health Channel is under the responsibility of the Ministry of Health. The Ministry of Education is in charge of the Education Channel, and the Civic Channels are routed to the Municipal City Halls by the Ministry of Communications, delegating the management of the channel to civil society groups and monitoring them. In the latter format, the first grant of a Civic Channel was given in 2013 to the Institute of Educational Radio Broadcasting of Bahia, but, in 2016, as a result of the new regulation, the first channel will be implemented in the town of Serra Talhada, in the hinterlands of the State of Pernambuco.
The Culture Channel should prioritize the alignment with the principles concerned with the universal right to art and culture, freedom of expression, cultural diversity, respect to human rights, right to information, to communication and to cultural cirticism, right to memory and tradition, and accessibility of the communication media. With the creation of the Culture Channel, the Brazilian government hopes to democratize the access to audiovisual works financed with public resources, to expand the access of the population to audiovisual content of collective interest and to achieve the expansion of independent audiovisual output in all the regions of the country to favor the dissemination of cultural diversity. Part of the Culture Channel content must be produced in Digital Production Centers that are being implemented by the Ministry of Culture in all of the Brazilian states. In 2016, the program will have contemplated 16 states.
In 2016, the amount of resources allocated for the implementation of this channel adds up to 2,957,093.00 USD, coming from the Sectorial Fund of Audiovisual, in partnership with the public corporation Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos – FINEP (linked to the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation).