Russia set to overhaul its television-and-radio network

Russia is beginning to overhaul its television-and-radio network on a grand scale, as it replaces obsolete equipment with state-of-the-art equivalents. This was disclosed today by Gennady Sklyar, general director of the Russian Television-And-Radio Network state-run integral enterprise. Sklyar was addressing a science-and-practical conference "The Role Of The Russian Mass Media And Data-Exchange Technologies In Regional Development," which opened here today.

Russia has never organized such a conference before. The Khabarovsk conference is sponsored by the Khabarovsk territorial government and the "Far East and Trans-Baikal Region" inter-regional association of Russia's constituent members, as well as mass-media people and the personnel of TV-and-radio centers from Moscow and other Russian cities.

The entire material-technical base of Russia's Far Eastern TV-and-radio networks, including TV-and-radio centers in some other Russian districts, was mostly established between the 1960s and the 1980s. The current state of such equipment now leaves a lot to be desired, conference delegates noted.

The conference will last for two days in a row. Its sessions are devoted to such issues as relations between the press and official authorities, the digital revolution in radio and TV, the consolidation and merging of all mass-media potentials, the role of mass-media bodies in socio-economic development and establishing regional political infrastructures, as well as the creation of a common information-and-education environment.

Sklyar and Khabarovsk-region governor Victor Ishayev signed a cooperation agreement during the conference. This document stipulates cooperation between the territorial government and the afore-said Russian Television-and-Radio Network state-run integral enterprise. It's intended to expand TV-and-radio broadcasting networks in line with the agreement's provisions.