Amendments to Ukrainian audiovisual media legislation governing the use of the local language on TV have come into effect.
According to the regulatory body National Council, they stipulate that in the total volume of broadcasting of national and regional TV channels the share of the Ukrainian language in films and programmes in each period between 07:00 and 18:00 and between 18:00 and 22:00 should be 75%, and 60% for local broadcasters. Furthermore, 75% of all news should be broadcast in Ukrainian.
There will also be a transitional period of one year during which the the transfer of domestic and national productions, regardless of the language they are shown in, will count towards the share of transmissions in Ukrainian.
The National Council will from now also monitor TV broadcasts, starting with those that preliminary data show to have the smallest share of Ukrainian language programmes.