ZAGREB, 28 March 2021 - The Electronic Media Agency (AEM) has published the results of research indicating that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a negative impact on 78% of electronic media's overall business outlets in Croatia.
When asked how the pandemic affected their overall business in 2020, 27% of electronic media outlets said it had a very negative effect, and 51% reported a mostly negative effect. Nearly 19% said that the pandemic had neither a positive nor a negative effect.
On the other hand, nearly 3% of electronic media outlets reported a generally positive effect on their overall business, but no one said that the pandemic had a very positive effect.
Pandemic had the worst impact on television and radio
The pandemic had the worst overall impact on television and radio broadcasters -- over 90% said that the pandemic had a negative or very negative effect on their business.
The research has also shown that 70% of media outlets were affected by the pandemic primarily financially, as a result of which they generated less revenue in 2020 compared to 2019. A fifth had the same level of revenue, while 10% saw an increase in revenue.
According to the respondents, the pandemic did not negatively impact the quality of media content.
Slightly more than 45% of respondents said that the pandemic had neither a positive nor a negative effect on the quality of media content, and 37% said that the pandemic had a generally negative effect.
Again, television broadcasters were the ones that reported a generally negative effect on their content in the highest percentage, of almost 55%.
The research has also shown that the government measures to help the enterprise sector in the pandemic, which also covered electronic media outlets, were used by just over 35% of the respondents. Of those that did, 90% said they used the HRK 4,000 wage subsidy measure.
More than half of media outlets satisfied with institutions' coverage of pandemic
Over half of the respondents (52%) said they were generally satisfied or very satisfied with the way institutions informed the media of the pandemic.
The research was carried out in the last week of January, and all radio and television broadcasters and providers of electronic publications and other media services were invited to participate.
Those are non-profit producers of radio or audiovisual programs, media services providers via cable, satellite, and/or the internet, and on-demand media service providers. The AEM had 607 of them in its records on the day the research began, and 235 service providers participated in the survey.
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