Sharp cuts at Radio Finland

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

Get to know Finland on shortwave while you can - Radio Finland will end foreign service broadcasts on shortwave in English, German and French. More details at http://www.dxing.info/news/2002_06.dx#yle

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

As expected, YLE has today confirmed plans to axe shortwave transmissions in foreign languages except for the Russian service. See the original news item from June at http://www.dxing.info/news/2002_06.dx#yle

YLE Administrative Council confirmed today that YLE will concentrate on serving Finns living abroad so that shortwave broadcasts in Finnish and Swedish will continue. Transmissions in English, German and French will end. News production in English for both TV and radio will continue at YLE24, the 24-hour news channel of YLE, but news in English will only be seen domestically on TV and heard on Capital FM. These news are produced by a team of four journalists who started at YLE24 in June.

The Council argued that broadcasts in Russian have a significant meaning for the Russian-speaking audience both outside and inside Finland, and should therefore continue.

Due to the cutbacks, Radio Finland is currently negotiating about laying off seven journalists who have produced programming in English, German and French.

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

Just received a message from Mr. Juhani Niinistö, Head of International Radio at YLE, with some more details:

"The Administrative Council of YLE has decided (August 26th) to close down international radio services in English, German and French. Services for Finnish nationals abroad in Finnish and Swedish will continue unchanged. Broadcasts in Russian will continue as well. The decision will reduce the annual transmitter hour volume of YLE Radio Finland from (2002) 46422 to 45122 hours.

YLE will continue domestic relays of international broadcasting on its FM (and DAB) frequencies in Finland. These include today stations such as ABC Australia, BBC, NPR, Voice of America, Deutsche Welle, Radio France Inteternationale, China Radio International, CBC, Danish Radio, Radio Vaticana, RNE Todo Noticias, SABC, and others. News in English for domestic radio and TV in Finland will continue to be produced by YLE24.

Programming in English has been produced by YLE in 1939-1957 and again from 1967. German aired 1939-1945 and again from 1985, French 1939-1957 and again from 1987-.

Since 1999 YLE international radio production in English, German and French has been produced with mainly domestic listening in mind. Broadcast time were changed to serve domestic prime time listening, mainly mornings. International distribution continued both on short wave and on satellites - though the volume was greatly reduced from earlier levels. The English half hour, for example, has been airing in three half hour beamings (was 11 reruns/beamngs in the early 90s).

The closing dates for the services have not been decided."

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

The last English broadcast is at hand:

"THE LAST EXTERNAL BROADCAST IN ENGLISH AIRS THIS SATURDAY YLE external service transmissions in English will be terminated this week. The last broadcasts in English air on Saturday Oct 26th at 07.30 UT on 21670 and 15135 kHz and at 12.30 UT on 15400 and 17670 kHz.

THE CAPITAL FM The YLE foreign language FM in the greater Helsinki area will continue - with relays of international radio stations in various languages as well as with news in English produced by YLE24. Parts of the Capital FM schedule can be heard on YLE stations in Turku, Tampere, Lahti and Kuopio. A new schedule of the Capital FM takes effect this weekend.

FROM THE ARCHIVES..In the last broadcast on Saturday excerpts from old festive season featues as well as part of the oldest broadcast still accessible aired on 1.1.1939."

See http://www.yle.fi/rfinland/en_etusivu.shtml for more info

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

Even though English is now history on shortwave, you can still get news from Finland in English also by YLE. Here's the latest development in the saga:

"YLE24 launches Teletext and Internet Services

YLE24 has significantly expanded its services for English speakers. YLE24 launched on Monday a new English-language service on teletext and Internet.

In addition to weekday morning TV newscasts and daily radio broadcasts, we now offer access to news in English about Finland on teletext and the Internet. The sites are maintained by YLE24's English-language editorial staff.

The teletext pages are 195 - 198. The Internet site is http://www.yle.fi/news . On our Internet site, you can also watch the morning newscast.

The service will be updated twice daily from Monday to Friday - at 11 a.m. and 11 p.m. During weekends the services will be updated only once daily at 11 p.m."

------

PS. A video file of the latest newscast can be found at http://www.yle.fi/yle24/videosali/news.html where you can choose between Real Player, Mediaplayer fast and Mediaplayer slow, depending on your software and bandwith.

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

The following statement comes from Radio Finland:
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Bad frequencies and bad reception are a tremendous public relations problem to an external service that has to compete with pay services available with mobile phones. The competitive edge of SW radio is the fact that listening does not cost anything. However, if the advertised signal is not there, the listener may rather pay for a mobile phone service than tolerate the non-availability of the signal. From the next schedule YLE will not include transmissions that are predicted to be risky in their main target area.

And in an early application of the policy YLE asked (Jan 13) its SW service provider Digita Ltd to take off the air, for the time being, the 100 kW service on 6120 kHz between 18 and 23 UT. The service for 240 deg and 60 deg was running parallel to a 500 kW service for 220deg. While the 500 kW service was being received in Spain and further, the 100 kW appeared to getting nowhere in the winter propagation conditions and strong interference from TRT. Listeners to 6120, if any, were advised to use 963 kHz (312m) that is widely available in Northern Europe during winter evenings. 6120/100 kW continues to be available between 05 and 18 UT.

Juhani Niinisto
YLE Radio Finland

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

The latest twist: Radio Finland may be shutting shortwave and mediumwave transmitters altogether

Details at http://www.dxing.info/news/2004_06.dx

Get it while you can - and post your comments here.

[Matti Ponkamo]

The latest twist: Radio Finland may be shutting shortwave and mediumwave transmitters altogether.

#¤%&* and other curses!
But on the other hand, now there will be more "free" frequencies...

Matti P.

[Peter Vrakking]

Eh, perhaps Radio Caroline can get back on the 963 kHz via Finland. Would be the stunt of the century

[Matti Ponkamo]

Yes, maybe we'll get 940 kHz "split" European frquency back, too.

73's Matti P.

[Peter Vrakking]

That will be a hard one in the Netherlands. Toulouse is very strong during night on 945 kHz with 300kW.

[Mika Mäkeläinen]

YLE plans to shop around to find other possible service providers on shortwave. The Controller of YLE Radio, Mr Heikki Peltonen, confirmed in a listener phone-in that YLE tries to find other possibilities of transmitting on SW. Historically, YLE has only been using the Pori base, owned now by Digita/TDF. YLE has never swapped time with others. The nothern location of Pori has made, at times, services to other continents problematic. And in winter time the skip zone is so vast that SW transsmissions from Pori have had to be closed down early this winter again, as the skip zone exceeded even the UK late evening.

International radio is almost exclusively an expatriate service matter for YLE. SW works well in serving scattered Finnish nationals worldwide, but is expensive. Plans by YLE to reduce the service were met with huge protests by the expatriate organizations in 2004. They describe SW as "a subjective right", particularly as Finland has of late confirmed "dual nationality" making many emigrants eligible for getting back Finnish citizenship - without losing their new one. (In no time at all the expats collected 15 thousand signatures in support of SW. This is not a shortwave listener movement, but an actual consumer protest in high volume.) Headed by former foreign minister and labour party chairman, Mr Pertti Paasio, the expatriate movement was effective in getting the attention of decision-makers and the political elite. Foreign language external radio was closed (except Russian) in 2002.

The present YLE contract with Digita/TDF comes to a close at the end of 2006.

YLE external radio is not a typical international service, but rather offers a generalist type of all day service. Listeners on 11755 in Western Europe get a mixture of music,news, sports, religious portions and even drama. Most of the service is a rehash of domestic networks, though not usually as a simulcast.