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Community Radio in the Pacific

Module 4_Topic 9: Community Radio in the Pacific

Community Radio in the Pacific

At the completion of the topic, you will be able to: Comment critically on the representation of gender issues in mainstream radio; Identify the broad aims of community media; Outline some specific objectives of community radio; and Provide specific examples of how community radio in the Pacific has contributed to womens empowerment.

femLINKPACIFIC (2008) Empowering Communities, Informing Policy: The Potential of Community Radio, available online at: http://www.femlinkpacific.org.fj/_resources/main/pdf/EmpoweringCommunities-InformingPolicyThePotentialofCommunityRadio.pdf

Community Radio in the Pacific

This lecture will examine how the small but vibrant community radio movement in the Pacific plays a critical role in promoting gender equality and empowerment.

Community media, Community Radio and Gender Empowerment Community media has the distinctive capacity to provide pluralistic and participatory communication that is receptive to the need for expression from the social and cultural sectors as compared to other media, particularly commercialized media (AMARC International Secretariat, 2008, 7).

In the Pacific region, radio is easily the widest reaching medium for communicating information. This medium is sometimes the sole means of information for people who cannot understand the newspapers or do not have access to television because of geography or cost factors. Radio reaches people who cannot read the daily newspapers or watch television because of language, geography or cost barriers. Many of these people live in rural areas and many are women (Yee in femLINKPACIFIC, 2011 ).

In recent years, there has been a small but growing community radio movement across the Pacific. Women and minority groups have turned to community radio to establish networks (especially among remote communities without television and internet access), share information and experiences and bring about social change within communities. In this way, there is recognition that in order to play a key role in society and in their development, women needed to be informed on what was going on around them and also have a means to speak on what was happening and their own voices heard which could only happen through having their own media (femLINKPACIFIC, 2008). As Joan Yee

highlights: Womens personal empowerment is closely linked to the availability of information (2008).

What are some examples of community radio in the Pacific region?

Community Radio in the Pacific

femTALK 89.2fm The launch of femLINKPACIFICs radio-station-in-a-suitcase (femTALK 89.2fm) on 5 May 2004 was critical for the development of Pacific (alternative) media and for generating urban-rural and regional collaborations among Fijian and Pacific Islander women. The Pacific regions first women-led mobile community radio station (based in Fiji) provided rural and semi-urban women with a safe space to speak and to be heard by other women nationally, regionally and globally (through digitalized recordings online). In the words of femLINKPACIFICs coordinator, Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls: This radiostation-in-a-suitcase has been taken out to rural and semi-urban women around Fiji, providing them with an opportunity to speak on issues concerning them while also allowing them to suggest how these issues could be resolved (femLINKPACIFIC, 2008). This approach affords community radio with the power to transmit grassroots womens lived experiences to policy-makers, mainstream media and broader civil society. In a broader sense, womens anecdotes can be used to lobby for the advancement of gender equality goals and social, political and economic change at community, national, regional and global levels. The radio programmes are complimented by publications such as The Community Radio Times and FemTALK 1325, as well as podcasts and a range of policy initiatives.

What is particularly striking about femTALK 89.2fm is that Pacific Island women are participating agents in this alternative news media. They participate in creating news, information, entertainment and other material that is of interest to their lives and communities. The community is also involved in managing the station and contributing to the content of the programmes. In other words, this medium is for, by, and about Pacific Island women (although it is important to stress that men should also be targets for community education and empowerment programmes). In the last seven years FemTALK89.2FM has reached women in rural centres in Fiji including Rakiraki, Ba, Lautoka, Nadi, Navua, Nausori and Labasa. Since 2011, community radio correspondents in Bougainville, Tonga and the Solomon Islands contribute to the content of the programmes. Click on this link to view this news item titled Rural Women Radio Activism: http://www.fijitimes.com/story.aspx?id=166178

One year before femTALK 89.2fm was born in Fiji, femLINKPACIFIC held community radio consultations with a range of non-governmental organizations and civil society organizations. In this sense, a range of organizations from Fiji and the Pacific contributed to the development of the stations philosophy and programme content. In addition to providing women with a voice, femTALK 89.2fm challenged the way

Community Radio in the Pacific

discussions on womens issues centred on entertainment news and recipes on mainstream radio stations by fostering a counter-dialogue on social, economic and political issues.

Programmes such as the Womens Civil Society Hour, the Market Report, Look at My Abilities, and an interfaith segment, provide an opportunity for representatives from Fijis broad civil society network to share news and information during the weekend broadcasts either through pre-recorded or live segments. Interviews from the

network of rural correspondents continue to provide rural features for each broadcast, while international segments, such as those from UN Radio is downloaded from the internet. (femLINKPACIFIC, 2008)

Listen to some of the programmes on femTALK by clicking the link below: http://www.femlinkpacific.org.fj/index.cfm?si=main.gen&cmd=audio

Some of the issues discussed in these programmes include women's access to good housing, food security, education and health issues. femLINKPACIFIC has also maintained long-standing relationships with sexual minority groups, such as Rainbow Womens Network and LGBT advocates such as Peter Sipeli and Marlene Dutta. The example below highlights femLINKPACIFICs work with other groups including health and transgender advocates. Maafafine moe Famili, 98 MHz, Tonga In March 2012, a second women-led community radio station will be established by fem LINKPACIFIC. The station, 98 MHz, is currently been set up in Tonga and will be officially launched on International Womens Day next year. The application to establish the community radio station was approved in June 2011. This community radio initiative merged out of the Pacific Media and Policy Network on the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 (Women, Peace and Security) where Maafafine moe Famili is a member, along with facilitators FemLINKPACIFIC. A Community Radio Roundtable was convened in Nuku'alofa in April 2011. It was agreed that the station will be an important peace-building tool for

Community Radio in the Pacific

community-based dialogue and discussion and also act as a tool for gender advocacy and empowerment. Betty Blake, the Director of Ma'afafine and convener of the 1325 Network in Tonga believes that: Our community radio station will build on our 1325 women's media initiatives in Tonga and bring women's voices from the communities we visit, and other civil society groups work, especially in rural and remote communities including to demonstrate the relevance of CEDAW and UNSCR1325 in the lives of Tongan women and men, especially as we do not have any elected women in our current parliament, it will be a very important advocacy tool to enhance efforts to link women with political decision making processes (femLINKPACIFIC, 2011). Click on the link below to read more about 98 MHz in Tonga: http://www.pmc.aut.ac.nz/pacific-media-watch/2011-04-06/tonga-first-women-led-

community-radio-consultation WUTMI 105.0FM, Marshall Islands Women United Together Marshall Islands (WUTMI) is a small non-governmental organization based in Majuro that sees itself as the voice of women in the Marshall Islands (WUTMI, 2009). This organization works towards improving the quality of life for Marshallese women and their families. It aims to fulfill this objective by creating cultural awareness amongst Marshallese women through the preservation of old knowledge (for example, legends, chants and traditional medicine) but also addresses the realities of modern life in the islands (WUTMI, 2009). WUTMI convenes conferences, seminars and workshops on health, environmental, education and cultural issues and provides counseling services to women subjected to violence or other forms of abuse. This organization also publishes a quarterly newsletter that documents all the activities undertaken by this organization. You can read more about this organization by entering the following website: http://www.wutmirmi.org/. In May 2011, WUTMI started up a small community radio station based in Majuro. Station FM105.0 received financial assistance from the Canada Fund. WUTMIs Director, Daisy Alik-Momotaro comments on the stations objectives: WUTMIs goal is to empower our women and girls. Our second goal is to promote and preserve our culture. We strongly believe the radio station will help us achieve these goals (Yokwe Online, 23 May 2011). The programmes aired on FM105.0 focus on educating parents and children and providing updates to the community on projects conducted by WUTMI. Specifically, the project purpose is to disseminate information to the people of the Marshall Islands, particularly women and young people in areas including: reproductive health, fertility and family planning, infant and child

Community Radio in the Pacific

mortality, child health, nutrition, HIV-AIDS, domestic violence and gender and development (Yokwe Online, 23 May 2011).

Click on this link to listen to some of the audio files from WUTMIs first twenty days on air: http://www.yokwe.net/index.php?module=News&func=display&sid=2864 The future for community radio in the Pacific is bright. Community Radio Advisor, Shirley Tagi, wonderfully summarises the power of this medium: Community radio is the bridge from the mat to the policy makers (femLINKPACIFIC, 2011).

AMARC International Secretariat (2008) http://www.amarc.org/wggtcr/text/Book_version_WEB_EN.pdf femLINKPACIFIC (2008) Empowering Communities, Informing Policy: The Potential of Community Radio , available online at: http://www.femlinkpacific.org.fj/_resources/main/pdf/Empowering-CommunitiesInformingPolicyThePotentialofCommunityRadio.pdf [accessed 28 June 2011] femLINKPACIFICs suitcase radio programmes, available online at: http://www.femlinkpacific.org.fj/index.cfm?si=main.gen&cmd=audio [accessed 7 July 2011]

Community Radio in the Pacific

femLINKPACIFIC, Fiji and the Pacifics First Women-led Community Radio Station Turns 7 on May 5, 2011, May 3, 2011, available online at: http://www.facebook.com/notes/femlinkpacific/fiji-pacificsfirst-women-led-local-community-radio-station-turns-7-on-may-5-201/10150176286309295 [accessed 11 May 2011] femLINKPACIFIC Progress on second 1325 Community Radio Station, 24 June, 2011, available online at: http://lyris.spc.int/read/messages?id=74535 [accessed 11 May, 2011] Pacific Media Centre, Tonga: First Women-led Community Radio Consultation, 6 April 2011, available online at: http://www.pmc.aut.ac.nz/pacific-media-watch/2011-04-06/tonga-first-women-led-community-radioconsultation Singh, Monika, Rural Women Radio Activism The Fiji Times Online, Wednesday 16 February 2011, available online at: http://www.fijitimes.com/story.aspx?id=166178 [accessed 11 July 2011] World Association for Christian Communication, Claiming the Power of Radio for Women in Tonga, available at: http://www.whomakesthenews.org/news/claiming-the-power-of-radio-in-tonga.html [accessed 30 May 2011] Yokwe Online, Marshall Islands Women on the Air at FM105.0, available online at: http://www.yokwe.net/index.php?module=News&func=display&sid=2864 [accessed 11 July 2011] Women United Together Marshall Islands (WUTMI), 2009, available online at: http://www.wutmirmi.org/ [accessed 10 July, 2011]