The Canada Media Fund (CMF) has made changes to its Slate Development Pilot Program in its second year, increasing the budget and making it more accessible to underrepresented producers.

The pilot program was launched in November 2021 as a way to provide development funding for producers of documentary and children and youth programming without requiring a Canadian broadcaster. Companies can receive up to $75,000, to a maximum of 84% of eligible costs, in development support for up to three projects.

CMF unveiled two critical changes for the second round. The budget has increased to $4.05 million, up from the $3 million budget at launch, and the funder has introduced two different levels of eligibility to provide more flexibility to First Nations, Inuit, Métis and racialized producers.

The Automatic Slate Allocation (ASA) eligibility is comparable to the requirements set at the program’s launch. Production companies must have received development and production funding (or at least two instances of production funding) within the last five fiscal years, and have either reported at least $75,000 in gross sales for English-language documentary or children and youth programming, or $50,000 for French-language programming in those genres.

The Selective Slate Allocation (SSA) is dedicated to companies that are majority-owned by First Nations, Inuit, and Métis or racialized individuals. To be eligible, they must have reported any gross sales for a CMF-funded project in the last five years.

A total of $1.125 million will be allocated to SSA-eligible recipients, with the remainder of the $4 million budget allocated to ASA-eligible companies. Similar to the previous year, one-third of the funding will go to French-language projects, and two-thirds to English.

Notably, companies that received funding from the 2021-22 program year are not eligible for the 2022-23 round. Eligible applicants for the program will be notified, according to CMF, assuming they have fulfilled their contractual obligations to report gross sales for any CMF-funded projects.

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