The Television Association of Programmers Latin America (TAP-LA) met in São Paulo last week with independent TV production companies represented by ABPI-TV. It was their first meeting on an institutional basis. According to ABPI-TV Chairman Marco Altberg, the discussion was highly positive. The programmers said they?re ready and willing to start collaborating on local productions during the current year. ?The channels also agreed to make room for Brazilian productions in their programming grids,? he says. The main stumbling-block is doubt about details of how co-productions will work, how resources will be shared etc. The two associations drew up a joint list of questions for Ancine, the audiovisual industry regulator, and scheduled another meeting for November.
Remittances on hold
Our research has detected another problem. Foreign programmers are supposed to deposit 3% of their revenue in a special fund called Condecine for investment in local production, but pay-TV operators aren?t making regular payments because of exchange-rate volatility and disputes with content providers. As a result, the programmers aren?t remitting money back to their parent companies in the U.S. or depositing Condecine dues.
