Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning, everyone. I hope you are hearing me okay.
One of my colleagues and I have undertaken a study whose main concern is Canadians' consumption of Canadian cultural products, more specifically in terms of journalism. I will try to put the issue of local and regional information in that context.
At local and regional levels, it seems to us that the challenges are very similar to those in large regions and on the national level. This comes with a number of challenges, which you are familiar with and which I will not dwell on.
The first challenge, of course, is the multitude of cultural products available to Canadians. That multitude leads to a splitting of audiences, a scattering of attention and a turmoil that force practically all the stakeholders to reposition themselves.
In that context, other phenomena change consumption habits, such as the invitation to the piecemeal consumption of television or audiovisual products. This is a “time budget”, or time spent on those types of activities when there is considerable demand for activities not directly related to cultural products, such as outdoor or tourism activities. We are also talking about financial budgets and the consumption of cultural products. The data shows that there has been a transfer toward distribution infrastructure—in other words, money people are likely to invest in it.
The second major challenge is the funding of those activities, especially during a transformation period when the players must invest substantially in innovations, be it for existing media, transfers or reorganizations. As they say, deep pockets are needed to survive periods that are not always profitable. Everyone has heard about the experiment the Gesca group has undertaken with La Presse +, without really knowing whether it would break even. The funding aspect is very important.
When it comes to journalistic information, there has been a change in context regarding distribution. Previously, that information was disseminated through media providing other content, virtual or symbolic. They may have included a recreational and entertainment aspect. There was also advertisement, of course. We are talking about a place of public expression, not only for organizations and institutions, but also, to a certain extent, for individuals. Yet everyone knows that those four parts of public expression, to put it that way, are slowly splitting up, and that this is causing all kinds of problems in terms of journalistic information.
As far as consumption goes, the rural/urban divide was also a major challenge. There have been population movements for a very long time, and they favour urbanisation. However, it seems that the arrival of the Internet and electronic infrastructure has lessened the divide between rural and urban areas and made it less drastic.
As for the media landscape, four main players are involved in local and regional information in the Quebec City region, for example. The Transcontinental company, which owns weekly newspapers, has become extremely important. It does its own digital transfers. Of course, those transfers involve some trial and error, but it is clear that the company wants to move on to multimedia in the subregions where its weekly newspapers are distributed.
The Quebec City region also has Quebecor, which is using MATV to try something that is between entertainment television and social television. We don't have an evaluation on that, but it seems that there are transformation periods every six months. There is a great deal of experimentation in this area, which is related to television.
In the Quebec City region, there are also existing community media, some of which play a role, not in terms of journalism training as such, but in terms of regional cultural production. I am thinking of the first community radio stations, such as CKRL, to name just one.
Of course, we have Radio-Canada, which also seems to be going through a period of accelerated downturn. In fact, its ability to produce regional and local news in the regions has greatly diminished. I would obviously add Le Journal de Québec and Le Soleil, which are periodically rebranding and are also experiencing downturn to a certain extent.
Another extremely important change has more to do with local and regional news than news in general, but in this case, new competition in the form of foreign distributors has had a significant impact. Our study was carried out to consider that issue. We wanted to determine how, in terms of daily consumption by Canadians, the transfer occurred between foreign products and local products.
You may say that the game has changed on the local level. All media used to really be part of a group. There was a dynamic, an interaction among media when it came to local and regional news. The situation could be compared to a chamber orchestra, which contains a limited number of instruments. Now, the orchestra is large, but there is no conductor. There are instruments—in other words, media—and some take leadership from time to time.
An entire dynamic, stemming from the splitting of the audience, has led the media to reposition themselves in relation to each other. In that context, traditional media such as Radio-Canada or Le Soleil get a lot of their content from social media, which in turn get their content mainly from websites, or individual, company or organization blogs.
The flow of information currently involves a lot of people. We are in a transition period where we are no longer sure who the main producers are in terms of daily regional information. That is a major challenge.
There is also an issue we are not really looking into—I'm talking about quality information compared with what could be considered as more unremarkable or fun information. That issue arises in the context of this dynamic of interactions, this game of the regional media orchestra. We are really facing a challenge.
In these conditions—and I will close with this—you may think of the crucial role Radio-Canada played during the interwar period. Radio-Canada was a very important factor in bringing Canadians together, be it in terms of infrastructure or content. There were exchanges between regions and so on. That role could be renewed, and Radio-Canada could again be something of a spine in this new context. It could be one of the main producers, but its internal operations, as well as its investments, would probably have to be reorganized.
Thank you.