site.bta Bulgarian Media Abroad Demand State Policy for Access to Information for Bulgarians across the World

Bulgarian Media Abroad Demand State Policy for Access to Information for Bulgarians across the World

Sofia, October 20 (BTA) -  How the state ensures access to
information about what is happening in their native country to
the Bulgarians abroad, is there a policy in this sphere and is
such a policy necessary in the era of the Internet and news
lurking at every corner is one of the subjects which will be
discussed at the 11th edition of the World Meeting of Bulgarian
Media. The forum, which will be held in Athens from November 4
to 8, is organized by the Bulgarian News Agency and the
Association of Bulgarian Media Abroad. This year's edition is
tilted "Media and Cultural Differences. Dialogue between
Neighbours".

Policy in the field of information about Bulgaria will be one of
 the subjects on the agenda. Representatives of the
parliamentary Culture Committee and the State Agency for
Bulgarians Abroad have been invited to participate in the venue.
 

This year's programme will begin with the most important
communication bridge created by BTA, which is the foundation on
which all Bulgarian media abroad step and work. They tell our
compatriots abroad about the problems, the achievements and the
development of Bulgaria and, vice versa, the Bulgarian media
which broadcast real-time and by the most modern means the range
 of problems typical of the various Bulgarian communities,
Culture and Media Committee Chairperson Polina Karastoyanova
commented for BTA. In her opinion, this is a virtual bridge to
which each meeting organized by BTA adds a new lane every year.
"It is our common objective to expand this large platform of
communication by all modern crossmedia means," Karastoyanova
said.

"I can definitely say that there is no state policy whatsoever
in respect to the access to information for the Bulgarians
abroad," the Editor-in-Chief of e-zine BG-GLAS, Georgi Donkov
said. For a large portion of our compatriots Internet
(particularly Facebook) is the only source of information, which
 is insufficient because it makes them vulnerable to
manipulation, he added. "I think the State could help by the
establishment and/or the support of various existing information
 channels that could gain the confidence of the audience with
professionalism and correctness," Donkov pointed out.

The information about the communities themselves is another
aspect of the subject as it comes to Bulgaria and becomes part
of the news in this country. Accurate information about the
Bulgarian communities abroad is definitely lacking at the
moment, Donkov said. BG GLAS has conducted a survey, which
established that in 2014 just 4 per cent of the news in
Bulgarian media related to Bulgarians abroad are not criminal
reports. These are really isolated cases, but people in Bulgaria
 are left with the opposite impression. To change this negative
image, once again there should be focused information channels
supported by various programmes and providing precise
information about what is happening in the Bulgarian communities
 across the world, he added.

At the same time, the State does not support in any way the
existing and already established Bulgarian media abroad and the
many years of their efforts in this respect. In Donkov's words,
the public Bulgarian National Television (BNT) has four channels
 with not a single show intended for Bulgarians abroad, and only
 one of them (BNT World) has online broadcasts abroad.

"Only the Bulgarian media abroad are the information
intermediary between the Bulgarian state and the Bulgarian
communities, and they are in need of serious support," the
Editor-in-Chief of "Bulgarski Horizonti" newspaper and radio
show in Canada, Maxim Bozhilov, claims. The reason for the weak
and sporadic, even chance, connection of the incumbent with the
increasing Bulgarian diaspora lies in the lack of any policy in
the field of information, he agrees.

Access to Bulgarian TV channels is a major problem abroad, the
Editor-in-Chief of the "Izvor" newspaper, Lyudmila Radeva
commented. "The least we would want as a Bulgarian community in
Crimea is to be able to watch national TV channels online. In
the age of Internet this should have been quite easy, but alas,"
 she added. Instead of relevant domains enabling Bulgarian
televisions to be broadcast across the world there are obstacles
 such as registration or complete blocking. These channels
should be advertised as absolutely free and everything possible
should be done to attract the attention of the Bulgarian
diaspora to them.

Another problem concerning the Bulgarian communities abroad is
the lack of a portal providing not only information about
various issues (taxes, pensions, migration, social, health care
and so on) but also allowing them mostly to be resolved
online.