The Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (SMCG) has been pointing to the poor position of local media for years. A survey on media business in Montenegro during 2020, published late last year, showed that local public broadcasters were at a loss of about 150.000 euros.

Although the research showed that the Montenegrin media performed positively overall in 2020, this does not apply to local public broadcasters, private television and periodicals.

In 2020, local public broadcasters generated a total of just over 4.2 million euros in revenue, mostly from local budgets, which accounted for 3.8 million euros or almost 90%, while marketing together earned about 300.000 euros or about seven percent of revenue. Their total costs were 4.36 million euros, which means that at the end of last year they had a total loss of 146.698 euros. Seven local public broadcasters operated positively, seven were in the red, one was at zero, while there is no reliable data for Radio Kolasin. At the end of 2020, a total of 331 people worked in local public broadcasters, and now significantly more because Gradska Television has also started working.
Of the 16 local public broadcasters, all have radio stations, 12 have portals, and six have TV channels.
Radio Television (RTV) Budva has the largest budget among these media, within which the RTV Budva portal operates as the third media. In 2020, it had revenues of around 938.000 euros, of which almost 796.000 came from the municipal budget, and revenues from marketing were 72.500 euros. The total expenses were around 878 thousand, which means that RTV Budva was in the surplus of 59.500 euros. At the end of 2020, it had 55 employees (48 for an indefinite period and seven for a definite period), and according to the management’s financial report submitted to the RTV Budva Council, the average salary was 547 euros, the only publicly available data on average salaries in local broadcasters.
RTV Niksic has a smaller budget than RTV Budva, but also the most permanent employees among local public broadcasters. That number in 2020 was 61, and they were in the plus of just over 58 thousand euros, with total revenues of almost 826.000 euros (690.000 from the Municipality but also almost 131.000 from advertisements) while expenditures were just over 767.000 euros. RTV Niksic also has a portal as the third medium.

For the full report go to: safejournalists.net