Technical Sustainability at Community Radio Core
If the equipment doesn't work, the radio is off air. A radio off air is
no good for all the important social, cultural and political development
plans of a community. And as the capacity to maintain and repair simple
- or not so simple - radio production and transmission equipment is not
necessarily available in a rural community, something important needs to
be done to finds ways of meeting these important needs.
As part of its own commitment to ensure sustainability for the eight
community radios started from scratch all over Mozambique with UNESCO's
support during the past four years, and within the framework of the
National Coordination Group of Community Radios, a process has been
ongoing for one year to identify ways of creating a national technical
sustainaibility network.
The culmination of the preparatory activity was a three day workshop
hosted by the UNESCO Media Project January 22-24 in Maputo, joining
potential core persons from the North, the Centre and the South of the
country to
(i) map the present technical situation - in all community radio
stations in Mozambique,
(ii) systematise the types of equipment, problems & locally identified
solutions and finally to
(iii) identify ways of meeting the problems and challenges - including
the initial design of an action plan for arriving at - what we
ambitiously call - "a national, technical sustainability network for
community radio".
When the work to establish a viable coordinated network for technical
sustainability of the community radios, the Coordination Group will move
on to find ways of designing similar sustainable systems in the area of
training and funding, basing itself as much as possible on local
tradition, creativity and experience - and learning from partners in
other parts of Southern Africa and elsewhere.
The partners in the group organising this network represent all the
different types of community-oriented broadcasting in Mozambique, namely
the state initiated and run ICS stations, the Catholic community radios,
one municipal radio and the group of stations owned, controlled and run
by community associations.