RTVA budget to fall by €50 million

Iñaki Ferreras | 02-11-2012

RTVE is experiencing the current crisis strongly, with its Board of Directors having recently approved a stable budget of €118 million for 2013.

RTVE’s contribution to the Radio Television of Andalusia (RTVA), whose operating budget will fall about €50 million from the current year, will be around €160 million.

The announcement was made by the Minister of Finance and Public Administration, Carmen Martínez Aguayo, and the Andalusian Government spokesman, Miguel Angel Vazquez, in a press conference following the meeting of the Governing Council, which approved the draft budget law of the Autonomous Region in 2013.

Martínez Aguayo explained that the Board maintains for 2013 the contribution of €118 million in 2012 intended to finance the RTVA "because we still believe that TV is a public service and we are not going to privatize it."

However, the finance minister has made clear that "it does not mean that the RTVA won’t have to make its own efforts in relation to total revenue" and pointed out that the public entity has "different sources of funding".

Meanwhile, Vazquez has advanced the operating budget of the RTVA fall by about €50 million next year to reach "slightly above" €160 million compared to €219 million this year.

RTVA’s CEO, Pablo Carrasco, recently said that to 30 September 2012, the public body exceeded the €4.7 million projected deficit for this year, initially set at €3.5 million. According to estimates, the RTVA losses will be less than €40 million when the year closes, somewhat better than those achieved in 2008, when there was no economic crisis and income by the Board and advertising were "much higher".