TV viewership reaches lowest point since January-March 2007

TV viewership figures have dropped sharply during this year's July-September 2012 period, the Broadcasting Authority has announced in its radio and television audience assessment report.

"The number of television views has remained constant over the first three quarters of this assessment period. For this quarter however, TV viewers have reached the lowest amount since January-March 2007; 12.704% lower than that recorded for the previous assessment period of April-June 2012; and 12.887% lower than that registered for the same period the previous year (July-September 2011)."

According to the report, TVM suffered a considerable drop in its viewership percentage, registering a drop of 9.93% over the previous assessment period of April-June 2012.

This, the report said, represents the largest decrease registered in number of viewers, and could account for a large part of the total TV viewership drop.

Despite this, TVM (26.43%) maintained its prime position throughout, increasing the percentage number of viewers over the same broadcasting period of 2011 by 0.45%.

The report also singled out TVM2 "for its sharp gain over the same period in 2011 and its continued increase over the previous quarter of April-June 2012."

The report details that ONE (17.08%) increased its viewership by 3.68% over the same period last year and managed to increase its viewership share by 2.47% from the April-June 2012 period.

"The largest increase by local TV stations over the previous quarter was registered by NET TV ( 3.52%) while Other TV Stations registered the highest increase of foreign stations."

With regards to radio audience figures, the BA report said that for 2012's July-September period, the number of radio listeners dropped by 1.81% over the previous April-June period.

At the same time, radio audience figures decreased by 10.53% over the same period last year.

"Those who expressly stated that they did not listen to radio (54.432%) exceeded regular radio listeners (41.816%) by 12.616% which was the highest registered since October-December 2006," the report said.

Bay Radio maintained the highest percentage of radio listeners (23.48%), increased its share by 1.36% over the previous April-June quarter, and has increased its share by 3.05% over the same period last year (which stood at 20.43%).

ONE Radio maintained its second ranking (17.60%) while increasing its share by 2.91% over the previous assessment quarter (14.69%) and further increasing its share by 4.60% over the same period last year 9standing at 13.00%).

Radju Malta ranked third (9.56%), increasing its share by 1.08% over the April-June period while also slightly increasing its share over last year's figures (8.62%).