Thank you.
The access to information is an issue if we're talking about recent immigrants. That is probably the most affected social group in this respect, because many of them don't speak English well, and their language of choice is almost always their native language. It especially applies to the seniors, the more elderly part of the population. They look for three types of information: information about Canada as a whole, the wider community; information about their ethnic community in Canada; and information about their home countries. They obviously can find the information about the wider Canadian community in the mainstream media, but as I've said, there is a language barrier.
To move to the second question about concentration in the media, and about the concentration process, that doesn't help, because when there are fewer mainstream media outlets or community media outlets—we're talking about geographic communities rather than ethnic communities—they tend to cover ethnic communities less and less because there are fewer of them, and they have to cover the same array of issues. The issues of the ethnic communities fall through the cracks as this process develops. Obviously, the ethnic media, the cultural media, have to compensate for this lack of coverage of their respective communities.
But the ethnic and cultural media do not cover only their communities. We always try to cover the wider community, and even some international issues. A lack of funding and, as the previous speaker mentioned, an inability to have professional staff and professional journalists on our editorial teams seriously reduce the opportunity for us to cover wider issues. As I've said, a lot of people, especially from the recent immigrant population, still turn to community media for the coverage of these kinds of issues.
The impact of digital media is quite substantial. I would say that community media are affected less than the mainstream media because there is huge technological progress being made at the moment. There are some platforms and media technologies that are still not being used, but it's all developing as we speak.
Our media group is currently starting to tap into that market. We are trying to position ourselves to be able to benefit from digital media and from the access to people who only use digital media as opposed to the printed media and even radio and television. It's very difficult at this stage to estimate the extent to which we will be able to benefit from digital media and the digital media market. For instance, it's very difficult to tell whether we will be able to compensate with digital advertising for the loss of the printed advertisements while still preserving the printed version of our newspaper, because it is only developing.
At the same time, there is also growing competition in that market, and for the community media as well, not only in the mainstream market. A lot of people are seeing opportunities—and actually the need—to develop digital outlets, and sometimes very informal outlets such as Facebook groups. They are being created. In our community and ethnic market, they're only starting to be created. It's very difficult to tell how long they will be able to survive and how they're going to affect the older community media, which is also entering this digital market. As I said, it's only developing.
However, I would say that the competition in that digital market for the community media is probably going to be as intense, if not even more intense, than in the mainstream markets of print, television, and radio. From the perspective of the ethnic and cultural media, I can tell you that the competition is very intense. From the community's standpoint and the wider community's standpoint, I consider this competition a very positive thing, because more voices are being heard and that contributes to the wider discussion.
In terms of the economic viability, it's too early to tell, but as for the government's position, I think that looking at supporting digital media and newer kinds of media in the same way that the government supports printed media through the aid to publishers program is probably worth looking at.
Thank you.