The COVID-19 pandemic has changed lifestyles and slowed down businesses across all sections of the society globally. If there’s one thing that the virus didn’t affect much it is the newsroom functioning around the globe.
Except for some slight hiccups in the revenue from advertisements, it is business as usual for the newsrooms of media houses in the country.
As much as it is important to stay safe, it is also equally important for journalists to inform their viewers and readers of ways to combat the pandemic and disseminate timely information regarding current happenings.
To keep themselves safe while informing others, a number of newsrooms in the country have adopted work from home and working on alternate days and weeks as strategies.
Ugyen Penjor, the Managing Editor for Kuensel said adopting physical distancing in the newsroom by dividing employees into groups is not very convenient. “We tried to divide the team into two groups- and then let one team work from home while the other in the office. But it really didn’t work out because it is quite difficult to work from home especially when you are a reporter and you have to go out reporting and also because some of us do not have the luxury to have a separate office at home. In terms of news, I think we have become busier like any other media in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic,” he said.
Similar is the case with BBS, Business Bhutan and other media houses.
For safety, some newsroom editors BBS talked to have been advising their reporters to avoid meeting their source of information in person. They have been encouraged to gather information and interview people over the internet and phone. While these are not the most convenient measures, newsrooms are trying to make do with it during this time.
Ashok Tirwa, the Chief Editor with BBS shares how COVID-19 has affected the quality of audiovisual medium media. “If you look at the content because we are broadcast where reporters and cameramen have to go out in the fields to get visuals and interviews, that aspect of the broadcast feature is hampered right now. We are trying to use as much graphics and internet pictures as possible to tell our stories. That is one difference you will see. The other one is, our reporters are divided into groups and working on multiple stories in a day whereas in the past you had a lot of time to work on a story. So the quality of telling the stories in terms of pictures has gone down,” he said.
On the whole, one impact that all the media houses are feeling during this time is reduced revenue from the advertisement for both the broadcast and the print media. In addition, the print media is also feeling the loss in revenue due to reduced circulation of its daily and weekly issues.
Ugyen Penjor, the Managing Editor for Kuensel says the revenue from both advertisement and circulation dipped more than 40 per cent after the pandemic. “I think our revenue has gone down by about 45 per cent. It is a ripple effect of the impact on the economy when there is no construction work or tender floated from the government because our main source of revenue is the advertisement. And most of the advertisements are announcements and notifications from the government. So when there is no work there’s no announcement so that way our display ad is affected. Even in circulation, when the hotel industry was hit we are hit also because our major subscribers are hoteliers. They buy Kuensel and distribute to the guests. So with all the hotels closed without tourists, our circulation has also gone down by around 40 per cent,” he added.
He added that Kuensel had to reduce pages of its weekly issues from 20 to 16 while the pages of the daily issues have been reduced from 12 to 10 because ads aren’t enough to fill in the pages reserved for ads section.
Similarly, Chencho Dema, a reporter with the Business Bhutan shares the effect of the pandemic on advertisement in the print media. “The impact on the paper could be seen from the impact on the revenue. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, we would get a good amount of ads but now if you check our papers for the past few weeks we hardly have any. It is very difficult even for the marketing officers to even get one page full which is sad actually and we can’t blame anyone it’s the pandemic,” she added.
Nonetheless, they shared that the newsrooms will not give in to the virus and that they will continue to keep their readers, viewers and listeners informed with as much correct information as possible. They shared that the role of media and journalists is critical around this time in giving out accurate and reliable information at the right time when some netizens are taking undue advantage of the situation by spreading false information and fake news on social media.
Phub Gyem
