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17. 05. 2013

ANEM PARTICIPATION IN THE DRAFTING OF THE NEW ADVERTISING LAW

Back in mid December 2012, ANEM submitted to the competent ministries the Initiative for adoption of the new Advertising Law, stating the reasons for strongly believing it was necessary to pass a completely new law and not just to amend the existing one, as envisaged by the Action Plan of the Media Strategy.

The competent Ministry of Foreign and Internal Trade and Telecommunications established in April 2013 a working group tasked with developing expert base for the Draft of new Advertising Law. One of the members of the Working Group is ANEM President Sasa Mirkovic, who submitted, on May 17, 2013, to the Ministry and other members of the Working Group, written ANEM's comments and suggestions on the Draft Advertising Law that serves as the basis for the following work on the legislation.

Basic comments of ANEM on the Draft Law relate to the following:

the importance of terminological standardization/ harmonization of certain definitions in the Draft Law with the definitions in the AVMS Directive and the Directive on Television without Frontiers, as definitions used in the Draft are imprecise and may cause problems in practice;
the necessity of specifying "product placement", especially regarding the sponsorship and in accordance with the AVMS Directive and the Directive on Television without Frontiers, as well as the practice of EU countries that have been gradually allowing product placement since 2010; it should establish different rules for product placement in services on-demand; the regulatory body for the electronic media should be given the authority to regulate more closely this matter with by-law;
the necessity of introducing restrictions for public service broadcasters, civil sector television stations, as well as local media that are financed from public funds (municipal budgets) until their privatization, in accordance with European legislation and practice, namely: the prohibition of product placement; prohibition of specific commercial programs and commercial features; broadcasting of TV advertisements and tele-shopping only between programs in prime time;
rules relating to the advertising on radio should be clearly separated; it is necessary to clearly specify which provisions of the law pertaining to TV media service and media on-demand services are applicable to the radio - ANEM has given concrete proposal for it; it is necessary to introduce certain restrictions in advertising on the radio programs of public service broadcasters (3 RTS' channels and 3 channels of RTV), programs of civil sector radio stations, programs of local and regional communities' radio stations until their privatization, in accordance with European legislation and practice (ANEM has given a concrete proposal for it, as well); a specific nature of radio program (for example, different prime time on radio than on TV) should be recognized and included in the Draft;
rules relating to the treatment of services on demand must also be prescribed in a separate section of the law, since the AVMS Directive establishes less stringent rules for programs that are provided on demand, so many of the requirements related to linear services are inapplicable here; ANEM has listed the rules relating to all services that can be applied here;
the importance of prescribing competence of regulators when it comes to localized rebroadcast of foreign programs (when rebroadcast foreign programs are "cut", namely interrupted with inserted advertisements of local advertisers), all in order to achieve equal position in the advertising market for all media service providers that broadcast advertising messages;
precise definition - audio-visual programs for self-promotion, in respect of which the declaration on the provisions of the Draft that govern this matter is then possible;
the necessity of different definition (modernization) of new advertising techniques, in accordance with the Commission Interpretative Communication on Certain Aspects of the Provisions on Televised Advertising in Television Without Frontiers Directive (2004/C102/02);
the necessity to specify provisions relating to calculation of time within the full hour allowed for advertising, considering the Commission Interpretative Communication on Certain Aspects of the Provisions on Televised Advertising in Television Without Frontiers Directive (2004/C102/02) - to prescribe in the law whether it is a natural or overlapping clock hour, (ANEM has suggested a natural clock hour);
In accordance with the same European documents, it is necessary to specify what is meant by "total daily broadcast program" - to define in the law whether it is a calendar day or programming day (ANEM has suggested a programming day);
it is necessary to regulate the so-called mini commercials (mini-spot), which are aired during periods of temporary interruptions during the broadcast of sports events, with the rules that should also refer to the "coverage of sports events of national significance", with the respect of related restrictions;
it is necessary to categorize the offense, because not all of them are of the same intensity and therefore different ranges of fines must be determined.

Based on these basic comments, ANEM also proposed numerous detailed suggestions for amendments to provisions of the Draft law.

ANEM believes that by participating in the Working Group, it will be able to properly contribute to the new Advertising Law to be better than the existing one, which would regulate better the advertising rules that are of great importance for functioning of media, in line with European standards and documents.