{"id":6061,"date":"2013-03-25T14:49:31","date_gmt":"2013-03-25T18:49:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/?p=6061"},"modified":"2013-03-25T15:00:45","modified_gmt":"2013-03-25T19:00:45","slug":"bbc-world-service-to-simplify-and-reduce-global-english-schedule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2013\/03\/bbc-world-service-to-simplify-and-reduce-global-english-schedule\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC World Service to “simplify” English and cut Arabic on shortwave"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"BBC-WorldService\"Sadly, the BBC World Service is going forward with cuts that had been announced in 2012.<\/p>\n

Global English service is being reduced, but Arabic services are being cut\u00a0altogether. The BBC expect to lose 1.5 million listeners to Global English cuts, 800,000 listeners to Arabic cuts.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, they will maintain all shortwave service into Sudan.<\/p>\n

Here is the full press release:<\/p>\n

(Source: BBC Media Centre<\/a>)<\/p>\n

25 March 2013<\/p>\n

The World Service English global schedule will be simplified with fewer regional variations from Sunday 31 March 2013 and shortwave Arabic broadcasts will cease.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The reductions to shortwave services were announced in October 2012 as part of the UK government\u2019s 2010 spending review. BBC World Service on FM and online and on television will not be affected and no language services are closing.<\/p>\n

Shortwave and medium wave transmissions in English will be reduced to a minimum of 6 hours in total each day. This will generally be two periods of between 2 and 4 hours each, usually at peak listening times in the morning and evening to help minimise disruption. The changes will have less impact in regions where World Service is increasingly accessed via partner stations or online and in countries where FM is widely available.<\/p>\n

Steve Titherington, Senior Commissioning Editor for BBC World Service, said: \u201cWe know that increasing numbers of people are accessing World Service on FM, online, and television. For those who can\u2019t access these platforms, we\u2019ve tried to ensure that they will continue to hear to the best the World Service has to offer at times of the day when they are most likely to tune in.\u201d<\/p>\n

“As part of the new schedule we will endeavour to have a mixture of news, current affairs and a mix of programmes covering the arts, science and human interest stories.” says Titherington.<\/p>\n

A new programme, The Newsroom, will replace World Briefing. Outlook will be extended to an hour-long format and offer a new approach to covering arts, music and humanities following the closure of The Strand. Every Friday, The 5th Floor will run in the prominent Outlook time slot offering a review of the pick of the BBC\u2019s 27 language services programing – in English.<\/p>\n

The estimated loss of listeners to Global English on shortwave will be around 1.5m listeners, equivalent to 1.3% of the total Global News English audience on any platform.<\/p>\n

BBC Arabic audiences are estimated to reduce by 800,000 as a result of the closure of shortwave broadcasts.<\/p>\n

In the Arabic speaking world, the World Service broadcasts on a network of FM relays, a 24-hour television channel and thebbcarabic.com<\/a>\u00a0website.<\/p>\n

Shortwave services to Sudan are not affected as the shortwave service is currently the most viable method of broadcasting to this large region.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sadly, the BBC World Service is going forward with cuts that had been announced in 2012. Global English service is being reduced, but Arabic services are being cut\u00a0altogether. The BBC expect to lose 1.5 million listeners to Global English cuts, 800,000 listeners to Arabic cuts. Fortunately, they will maintain all shortwave service into Sudan. Here […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[56,3],"tags":[352,1435,1815,1816,556],"class_list":["post-6061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-broadcasters","category-news","tag-bbc-world-service-cuts","tag-bbc-world-service-english","tag-bbc-world-service-english-language-service","tag-bbc-world-service-shortwave","tag-bbc-ws-cuts"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pn3uc-1zL","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":4739,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2012\/10\/bbc-shortwave-hit-by-world-service-cuts\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":0},"title":"BBC: Shortwave hit by World Service cuts","author":"Thomas","date":"October 25, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"As we mentioned last week\u00a0in our post with the\u00a0internal memo from the BBC World Service, the BBC has now formally\u00a0announced\u00a0that World Service shortwave broadcasts in Arabic are to close by next April and the Cyprus shortwave relay station will close as well. (Source: BBC) Short wave broadcasts of World Service\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Broadcasters"","block_context":{"text":"Broadcasters","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/broadcasters\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/medium_bbcarab_en.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":6108,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2013\/03\/allens-thoughts-as-bbc-cyprus-relay-station-closes-today\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":1},"title":"Allen’s thoughts as BBC Cyprus relay station closes today","author":"Thomas","date":"March 30, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"SWLing Post reader, Allen, writes: BBC's Cyprus relay station is being closed down today after more than 50 years of service. The BBC currently uses the station to broadcast its Arabic radio service to the Arab world on short wave. The BBC will still incur the cost of making its\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Articles"","block_context":{"text":"Articles","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/articles\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"bbc_arabic","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/03\/bbc_arabic.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8821,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2014\/02\/bbc-world-service-to-further-reduce-shortwave\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":2},"title":"BBC World Service to further reduce shortwave","author":"Thomas","date":"February 19, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I appears the BBC World Service is cutting shortwave broadcasts even further in an attempt to meet tighter budget numbers. Not many details, at the moment, in terms of what language programs will suffer the most. Many thanks to Richard Cuff for the tip: (Source: The Guardian) The BBC World\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Broadcasters"","block_context":{"text":"Broadcasters","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/broadcasters\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"(Image source: BBC)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/BBC-Headquarters-300x168.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":54176,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2022\/09\/the-guardian-hundreds-of-jobs-to-go-as-bbc-announces-world-service-cutbacks\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":3},"title":"The Guardian: “Hundreds of jobs to go as BBC announces World Service cutbacks”","author":"Thomas","date":"September 29, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"(Source: The Guardian via Mark Hirst) Hundreds of jobs to go as BBC announces World Service cutbacks Corporation to end production of radio output in 10 languages, including Chinese, Hindi and Arabic, as it blames licence fee freeze The BBC has announced deep cuts to its World Service output that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News"","block_context":{"text":"News","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/news\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/PL-680-BBC-Click-Frequency.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/PL-680-BBC-Click-Frequency.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/PL-680-BBC-Click-Frequency.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/PL-680-BBC-Click-Frequency.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4716,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2012\/10\/bbc-internal-memo-outlines-year-three-cuts-and-changes-to-the-bbc-world-service\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":4},"title":"BBC internal memo outlines year three cuts and changes to the BBC World Service","author":"Thomas","date":"October 19, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"This BBC internal memo, sent to employees by World Service Director,\u00a0Peter Horrocks, outlines the unfortunate pending cuts and changes in much greater detail than those presented by the press. Here is the memo in its entirety--it concludes with further comments from internal sources: Dear colleagues\u00a0 Today we are announcing Year\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Broadcasters"","block_context":{"text":"Broadcasters","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/broadcasters\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/BBC-World-Service-007-300x180.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1216,"url":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/2011\/06\/hague-giving-bbc-world-service-2-2-million-to-save-hindi-shortwave-broadcasts\/","url_meta":{"origin":6061,"position":5},"title":"Hague giving BBC World Service \u00a32.2 million to save Hindi shortwave broadcasts","author":"Thomas","date":"June 28, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"This is fantastic news for BBC World Service's Hindi shortwave broadcasts. The allocated funds will be given to BBC WS over a 3 year period.Kudos to Foreign Secretary, William Hague, for recognizing the impact of BBC Wold Service's Hindi language service. Sadly, the cuts in funds earlier this year will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Broadcasters"","block_context":{"text":"Broadcasters","link":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/category\/broadcasters\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/06\/William_Hague-204x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6061\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swling.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}