Business Savvy Key to Sustainable Media Development in Liberia

In the years following the 14-year war, Liberia witnessed robust growth in the media sector. There are now about 40 newspapers, more than 20 Monrovia-based radio stations, and about 50 community radio stations around the country.

The question is, can this growth in the media industry be sustained? Many experts say no, arguing that in a country of 3.5 million people, the market is already saturated. 

Media is a business that survives on sales and advertising revenue. However, a recent IREX survey suggests that advertising in Liberia is still in a nascent stage. The private sector is quite small and only two industries — telecommunications and banking — have shown an interest in placing ads. On top of that, many Liberians do not have the means to buy the goods and services that are most often the source of advertising revenue for media in other countries.

What does this mean? It means the chances of survival in the Liberian media market are slim without a concerted effort to get media managers to understand the business of doing business. There is a naiveté about the business side of the media industry among many managers who fail to recognize that their outlets are business entities and must be run as such. Additionally, many lack the skills and experience to develop effective business models. 

To address this, IREX sponsored several finance and business managers to attend courses at the Liberia Institute of public Administration (LIPA). We've also worked with the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ), UNESCO and SPARK, a Dutch NGO, to do business and financial plan development training. Mentors from this group are now working with partner outlets to develop strategic business plans and reorganize their finance and business departments. In the months to come, we plan to identify and tap into advertising markets that make sense for Liberians.

We are "training the trainers" to scale up our development efforts and to achieve sustainability. Five trainers we recently sent to South Africa have returned to Liberia to spread the knowledge they gained to media outlets throughout the country. The process will be repeated later this year with five more participants going to South Africa. With 10 trainers, we will eventually help many more to compete in Liberia's highly competitive but fragile media market.

The task ahead is huge and there are many moving parts. With some added business savvy, however, media enterprises will have a much better chance of fulfilling their vital role in civil society in the future.

Bill Burke has been with IREX since March, 2010, as a media lead on the Civil Society and Media Leadership Program in Liberia. Previously, he spent 10 years working for CNN, including five years as head of the team that produced CNN’s award-winning program, Inside Africa. In 2006, he moved to CNN’s global newsroom producing some of the network’s signature shows. He left CNN in 2008 to work as an independent media consultant, working primarily on helping to rehabilitate the media in Liberia.