Producers Told to Play to Viewers' Tastes

BEIJING --- Participants at the academic seminars held as part of June's China TV Fair in Beijing have been told in no uncertain terms that producers at state-owned broadcasters should become more market-oriented, rather than relying on State subsidies and should start aspiring to win market share, not government awards. 

The calls for market-based programming came from speakers representing major independent production companies that have been created from existing state assets, but which are now operated as independent ventures. 

The most vociferous of the attacks on prevailing systems came from Yang Yubing, General Manager of the Shanghai Paradise Film & TV Co., one of China's leading production companies which is overseen by the Shanghai RFT Bureau. Yang told the audience that to survive in a market economy, TV enterprises have only one way out - to sharpen their competitive edge in line with the laws of the market. 

Yang said that China's TV program industry has long operated according to the former Soviet production system that centers around directors and that decades of practice have fully exposed the defects of the system. He said, "A good director does not necessarily make a good producer". 

"After several years of experiment, we have made up our minds to institute a new system of production centered on producers," said Yang. 

Under the new system, producers would share not only the profits but also run the risk of losses arising from their productions. They would have to be well informed of the demands of the market and good at making budgets. 

According to official press reports of the lively session, the time when the government provided the TV program sector with substantial subsidies and mobilized investment has gone and TV enterprises will have to compete in capital markets. 

The TV sector will also have to turn to the labor market nationwide, and even overseas, to find the special talents it needs by adopting a personnel system which combines long-term contracted workers and temporary project workers. 

Although Yang's visions make sense to Paradise, which is still seeking its listing on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, the situation in less forward looking places is much less conducive to the implementation of such plans. 

In many cases, this is because the local leaders with the power to push through reform even at the relatively low levels required to establish a small production company tend not to be those that are being forced to accept market conditions. 

As for the senior directors and producers who Yang says must take control of production, they were among the first to benefit from the introduction of commercial funds into TV production through sponsorship and barter agreements and are not short of work, thank you very much. 

This leaves younger talent and money coming directly from the private sector to pioneer new production standards. While this type of funding was behind the growth in TV dramas in the mid-nineties, the Internet and cyclical favorites such as real estate have replaced the attraction of TV production as an investment for the new rich. 

Younger producers also lack the credibility to secure top slots on terrestrial channels and have been forced to work with local cable stations with low advertising rates. In turn, this has forced them to divert their attention from production to securing mini-broadcast deals on multiple services. 

Thus, while Yang's Paradise Group is succeeding in showing how a Chinese state owned media company can adapt itself into a commercial venture and succeed in the market, many of his plans remain pipe dreams for his colleagues at the seminar and around the country.