Happy World Radio Day! Today marks another annual celebration of radio around the world. Organized by UNESCO, this year’s event is focused on radio’s role in gender equality. Radio organizations are marking World Radio Day in numerous ways, with some airing special programming and others holding celebrations. You can listen to a range of World Radio Day-themed audio contributions on Sound Cloud. UNESCO is also hosting live radio broadcasts from its Paris headquarters today.
For the past two year, public media expert Sabrina Roach has marked World Radio Day by reflecting on the importance of low power FM (LPFM) and community radio in the United States. Last year she hosted an event for low power FM applicants in Seattle and this year she wrote a piece about the important connections between community radio and public radio and calls for more collaborations between local communities and larger stations. She writes, “…World Radio Day is this Thursday, February 13. It’s the perfect time to talk about how Low Power FM Radio could change the public and community radio landscape in the United States.” We couldn’t agree more. The imminent launch of hundreds (and counting…) of new LPFM community radio stations makes for a particularly exciting World Radio Day this year.
Although we mainly focus on radio in the United States on Radio Survivor, we enjoy learning more about radio around the world. In honor of World Radio Day, here are a couple of recent global radio stories:
CANADA: Cape Breton University to Get FM Frequency
Caper Radio at Cape Breton University will soon obtain an FM frequency. The online station hopes to be on the air within a year and will “start out with a developmental licence and a limited broadcast range, but they hope to quickly grow the station and expand that range to more of the island,” according to the Cape Breton Post.
HUNGARY: Civil Radio Seeking Help to Keep Station on the Air
Hungarian community radio station Civil Radio has embarked on a fundraising campaign to ensure the station’s future in light of a decrease in government funding. According to the SOS Civil Radio website, “…Over the years, we have never been the favourites of the governments in power, but we were always able to collect our annual budget from various grants, tenders and other funding sources in the past 20 years. Political changes in the last few years are affected negatively Hungary’s media sector and the whole of Hungarian civil society. This has changed the life of Civil Radio completely and made our situation nearly impossible to continue broadcasting. Most of the Hungarian independent community radio stations have disappeared in the last three years — and now Civil Radio is under threat to be the next.”
How are you celebrating World Radio Day?
