Bill Roberts is secretary-general of the North American Broadcasters Association.

Broadcasting services and audiovisual content will be important issues debated at the ‘Millennium Round’ of negotiations at the World Trade Organization, beginning no later than January 2000.

Late this November, the third WTO Ministerial Conference will take place in Seattle. At this meeting, rules will be established for the structure and procedures of the formal discussions starting in January 2000. The process itself may take more than four years to complete, and while no one can predict the outcome of complex negotiations, the North American Broadcasters Association believes the implementation of a new trade accord could have wide-ranging implications for Canadian broadcasting policies.

As the only continent-wide association of broadcasters and broadcast-affiliated organizations, naba represents the major television networks in Canada, the u.s. and Mexico. One of the world’s eight broadcasting unions, naba is the only broadcast entity in North America with non-governmental status at the World Intellectual Property Organization, the International Telecommunications Union and unesco.

Because of our membership base and international status, naba is ideally suited to assume an ‘honest broker’ role in the wto ‘Millennium Round’ of negotiations, and in the closely related wipo negotiations on new rights affecting broadcasters.

What’s at stake

Why should we care about the wto negotiations, particularly as they affect Canadian television?

Canada has a set of policies that have provided an effective framework for the growth of a strong Canadian independent production sector, and the development of a distinctively Canadian broadcasting industry. These policies include, but are not limited to:

* priority access for Canadian television services to distribution systems;

* Canadian content quotas for conventional over-the-air television broadcasters and specialty service providers;

* public funding for Canadian television productions.

However, the issue of Canadian ‘cultural protectionism’ has assumed increasing priority in the u.s., where broadcasting is seen not from a cultural perspective but as part of the entertainment industry.

According to Chris Sands of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, d.c.: ‘Washington has always understood that other trading partners would look to the u.s. treatment of Canada for precedents, since most countries aspire to have the kind of access to the American market that Canada enjoys, and since successful Canadian protectionism can be a model for other countries seeking to escape u.s. retaliation.’

Given the American pressure for greater worldwide market access for the u.s. entertainment industry, coupled with the global trend toward increased trade and investment liberalization, the ‘Millennium Round’ of negotiations could affect Canadian cultural policy in the following ways:

* reduce or remove foreign ownership restrictions;

* limit bilateral coproduction treaties;

* alter definitions of domestic content currently favoring domestic actors, directors, writers, producers, musicians and composers;

* reduce requirements to broadcast minimum levels of domestic content;

* reduce or eliminate government grants or subsidies, particularly if products are destined for export;

* allow foreign investors to sue governments directly;

* require compensation for the expropriation of a broadcast licence.

On the other side of the coin, there may be potential benefits to Canadian broadcasters if certain regulatory restrictions, for example, on foreign ownership, are relaxed.

In a submission last April to the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, the Canadian Association of Broadcasters argued that an increase in foreign ownership levels should be explored.

There are other areas of potential consensus. Canada’s Cultural Industries Sectoral Advisory Group on International Trade has suggested that a rules-based approach to the settlement of broadcasting’s trade and investment disputes could be a preferable strategy for the future. This means that it would not be necessary to exclude culture from international trade negotiations. It’s naba’s understanding that the Office of the US Trade Representative also favors a rules-based approach.

In a recent paper, Jonathan P. Doh of American University discusses an interesting example of the creative resolution of a potential dispute between the u.s. and Mexico around an emerging gray market in satellite television:

‘Facing a problem similar to the unlicensed satellite access by Canadians to u.s. signals, the Mexican government basically acknowledged that it could not prevent American satellite signals from reaching Mexican viewers. Instead, Mexican authorities elected to negotiate a reciprocal agreement to provide their Spanish-language signals access to the lucrative u.s. market, with only limited restrictions to keep out obscenity and require some public interest programs.’

We need to find more elegant solutions like this one.

NABA’s role

The time is ripe for North American, particularly Canadian, broadcasters and regulatory bodies, to identify critical issues, to agree on key questions and definitions related to those issues, and to provide an appropriate level of information exchange and dialogue.

naba has been preparing the ground for several years. In 1998, we commissioned Broadcasting and Trade: Information and Source Material from Coopers & Lybrand to provide our members with basic information with respect to trade and intellectual property agreements. Over the past two years, we have organized comprehensive trade panels at our annual general meetings, including speakers from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

We’re looking forward to implementing a proposal from the European Broadcasting Union that naba host a Year 2000 summit of broadcast executives from both North America and Europe to deal with trade issues. A mini-summit of that nature will occur this year at the naba co-organized United Nations World Television Forum on Nov. 19, which 600 broadcast personalities from around the world are expected toattend.

We have recently embarked on an important research project to determine what trade and investment issues are a priority for naba members and whether there are areas of potential common ground between them. Based on in-depth interviews with a cross-section of our members, the resulting report should suggest the next appropriate steps for naba in the wto process and perhaps some new directions for North American broadcasters generally.

What’s next?

In the August issue of The Canadian Forum, Ted Magder, on leave from Toronto’s York University and now director of Communication Studies at New York University, wrote: ‘Canada can no longer make cultural policy in a vacuum and it cannot afford to have its only meaningful conversations with Americans about trade in culture during eleventh hour negotiations.’

We couldn’t agree more.

naba’s members have already established a dialogue on trade issues with government representatives as well as with each other to explore the pros and cons of various models.

We know it will be a major challenge for North American broadcasters to reach a consensus on the rules of trade in broadcasting. naba is looking forward to making a contribution to meeting that challenge.