ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

I am the Media Minister of a post-communist country. I had to cope with a media sector that never broke free from the old way of doing things. Most companies were in a virtual state of bankruptcy. One of our leading publishers put me in touch with WDPC. I had them come to my country and do an analysis of our entire media sector. How could we get out of the rut we were in I asked. The problems they found were many. WDPC advised that we start by strengthening the weak editors and publishers association we had. That could serve as a means for acquainting members with modern media business practices. WDPC had to literally teach the association how to be a member oriented association. The next problem WDPC identified was our media laws. They unfairly limited the amount of advertising publications could have. Most publishers had sales that were so weak that this never occurred to them. But of course it was important if they were to grow profitable. Those laws actually kept our whole advertising industry in a very constrained position. WDPC drew up a list of the changes that were needed. I presented them to our Parliament and they adopted almost all. They reserved a few loopholes for themselves to exert pressure on the news media. But that was minor compared to the way things were. After the laws were changed the impact was quick. Our advertising industry was recognized for being one of the fastest growing in the whole world.