Print media expands despite Internet boom: Survey

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 11/13/2009 11:06 AM  |  Business

The digital revolution has yet to undermine the role of printed media as the main information source in Indonesia, defying a trend in western economies to shift over from print to Web, a survey reveals.

The survey, carried out by the Institute of Research, Education and Information of Social and Economic Affairs (LP3ES), finds 60 percent of its respondents use print media as a source of information.

There were 2,971 respondents surveyed in 15 major cities in the country and each could choose more than one media as their information source. The electronic media category, which included television and radio, topped the survey with 90 percent of respondents. The Internet came third with 34 percent.

The survey found that printed media grew in the past three years. The total number of newspapers reached 251 in 2006, 269 in 2007 and 290 in 2008. Within the same period the number of magazines totalled 258, 297 and 318 respectively.

Daily newspaper circulation within the period reached 6.06 million, 7.22 million and 7.49 million respectively, while magazine circulation reached 5.52 million, 5.73 million and 5.92 million respectively.

Among the printed media, 91 percent of respondents chose daily newspapers as their main source of information, followed by 13.6 percent choosing weekly tabloids, 9 percent monthly magazines and 7.3 percent weekly magazines.

The survey reflected the results of another survey carried out by AGB Nielsen Media Research, which showed that television and printed media continued to absorb most  spending on advertising.

The Nielsen survey showed that television was the biggest players in 2008, controlling 63 percent of the market share while print media, including newspapers, magazines and tabloids, absorbed 37 percent.

Advertising revenue received by newspapers in 2008 rose by 29 percent to Rp 13.8 trillion ($1.3 billion) from Rp 10.6 trillion the year before.

The situation in Indonesia is starkly different to the western world, particularly the US where major newspapers are folding up (LA Times, Chicago Tribute, Rocky Mountain News and Baltimore Sun) due to competition with online news providers with some newspapers transforming from daily publications to weeklies, monthlies or even going completely on line.

“Don’t be trapped into what happened with American newspapers. We are in a different situation,”
said Association of Newspaper Publishers (SPS) Executive Director Asmono Wikan.

Asmono claimed the newspaper industry in Indonesia was still growing significantly despite increased public access to the Internet. The Association of Internet Service Providers said there are now 25 million Internet users in Indonesia.

Asmono said that Indonesia had different demographic characteristics and had been able to survive the global economic downturn.

“The survey proves that most Indonesians still read newspapers,” he said.

Asmono said that middle-low income citizens were still a prospective market for print media and therefore publishers should be optimistic that the number of readers would keep growing.

However, an analysis by global business consultancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers concluded that the growth of digital ads in Indonesia would soon threaten printed media and even television.

Global business consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers predicted that spending on digital and mobile ads in Indonesia would be stagnant from 2009 to 2010 but would then boom by an annual 14.5 percent from 2011 to 2013.

Noted internet publisher Yahoo predicted that digital advertisers in Indonesia would spend up to US$26 million this year.

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