A consultation by France’s Ministry of Culture on a controversial “cable-satellite” decree is due to end this week.
According to Les Echos, the decree defines the obligations of TV channels distributed via cable and satellite and will be finalised by the end of the year.
It adds that it will complete a “regulatory trilogy” alongside the so-called “Smad”’ decree on platforms such as Netflix which was published in June and the TNT decree for terrestrial channels, which is in the final stages of being implemented.
Les Echos quotes Richard Maroko, president of ACCeS (Association of contracted channels editors of services), an industry body representing 100 channels including those from Disney, Canal+, Viacom and Discovery, as being critical of the “cable-satellite” decree.
ACCes says that 35 thematic pay-TV channels have closed in France since 2010 and the sector, which has a turnover of over €1 billion and employs over 4,000 people, is suffering from the health crisis and strong competition from SVOD platforms like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.
Under the terms of the “cable-satellite” decree, thematic channels will be required to allocate – in most cases – 12% of their turnover to the financing of French or European productions.
