Insights from Asia's media revolution

One of the most interesting sessions hosted by the recent Arab Media Forum in Dubai examined the media boom in Asia. When talking about ‘the media revolution' in Asia, one must first take into account the fact that Asia is the world's largest continent — both in terms of area and population. This means that we are talking about numerous countries and nations with different systems, goals, cultures and levels of development. This makes it very difficult to formulate an opinion applicable to all Asian nations concerning the factors behind the progress of their media.

However, if we confine our discussion to Asia's two giants, namely China and India, in addition to a medium-sized Asian power such as Indonesia, given its status as the world's fourth-largest country in terms of population, and as the newest and biggest democracy in Southeast Asia, one can attribute the current development in the media in Asia to mainly five major factors: the huge size of the populations in India, China and Indonesia, which together total 2.5 billion; economic development, which has increased the size of the middle classes and consequently led to a remarkable improvement in the standards of living and education of tens of millions of people; the concentration by manufacturers of Asian products on both competing globally and marketing locally has led to a huge amount of money being thrown into advertising, from which all media sectors have massively benefited, consequently surviving, expanding and competing; the availability of huge, qualified and well-trained workforces; and finally, the policy of some governments, such as India's, to attract foreign tycoons to invest in their media.

Indonesia constitutes a good example of how changes in the regime lead to changes in the media. During the Suharto dictatorship, Indonesian media had no credibility. Even advertisements during that era were used exclusively to promote the products of companies owned by the Suharto family or their cronies. At the time, there was only a handful of heavily censored newspapers, radio and TV stations. However, the entire scene has changed in the post-Suharto era, especially as 85 per cent of the population is now literate, and 65 per cent of them are less than 34 years old.

As a result, more than 1,000 newspapers and magazines had emerged in Indonesia by the beginning of the third millennium. The number of local TV channels increased from two to 10 in less than five years, while the number of illegal TV and radio stations reached more than 2,000.

Meanwhile, in India, it was reported in 2006 that the media sector was worth some $8.9 billion (Dh32.7 billion), and that number could jump to $19 billion (Dh69.8 billion) by the end of 2010. Factors given for such a remarkable development included cultural and economic ones, in addition to a demographic factor, namely the fact that over 700 million Indians are in their thirties.

All these factors combined probably encouraged global media giants such as Sony, Paramount, Disney, Fox, Time Warner and the BBC, as well as the world's giant dailies, such as The Financial Times, The Independent and The Herald Tribune to enter the Indian media market.

Tremendous growth

According to a recent survey, the average growth in the media in India in 2004 and 2005 was much more than that in the US and UK in the same period. Also, the annual growth in the press was 14 per cent. The number of readers of newspapers and magazines has increased from 206 million to 222 million in 2005. Among India's 5,000 dailies, 12 have been selling 16-17 million copies a day.

With more than 350 TV channels and an average annual increase of 50 channels, India has become the world's third biggest TV market.

In India, most weekly magazines still make profits. As a result, numerous international magazines — such as Vogue, OK, Hello, Marie Claire, Fortune, People and Maxim — have started publishing in India. They are all making remarkable profits.

China, meanwhile, because of the totalitarian nature of its regime, has not been able to compete with India as far as attracting foreign investment in its media is concerned. All media in the country are strictly censored.

However, in recent years China has witnessed some remarkable developments in the media. In 2003, there were more than 2,000 dailies, 8,000 magazines and 3,000 TV stations, in addition to 2,000 media groups with websites. According to these figures, China now has the second largest number of websites after the US.

I believe that Arabs should not borrow others' models, but prepare their own — in the media and other fields. This is, of course, a long process, and involves spending more money on research; teaching members of the community to respect the law; ridding themselves of outdated slogans, notions and thoughts; planting the seeds of such values as creation, innovation and hard work in the hearts and minds of the young; and replacing their education system with a new one that concentrates on knowledge of the present, rather than knowledge of the past.

Moreover, the Arab countries need to engage tools of culture and arts — cinema, theatre and literature — in addition to the tools of media — radio, TV, newspapers, magazines and internet — in the development process. In this way they may succeed in controlling the negative aspects of their societies, which have prevented them from advancing and progressing.

Dr Abdullah Al Madani is a Bahraini researcher specialising in Asian affairs.