"Terrestrial Broadcasters Receive More Than Twice the Content Fees Despite Lower Ratings Than General Programming Channels"

Terrestrial channels have been found to receive more than twice the content usage fees from pay broadcasters despite having lower viewership ratings than some comprehensive programming channels (general programming channels, or 종편).

On the 16th, Ha Young-je, a member of the National Assembly's Science, Technology, Information and Broadcasting Communications Committee, revealed this after analyzing Nielsen Korea's viewership ratings and broadcaster asset disclosure data.

TV Channel Viewership Ratings Over the Past 3 Years [Data Provided by the Office of Assemblyman Ha Young-je]

According to Nielsen Korea's TV channel viewership ratings from 2020 to 2022, terrestrial channels recorded KBS2TV at 2.41%, SBS at 1.97%, and MBC at 1.67%. During the same period, general programming channels had ratings of TV Chosun at 1.97%, MBN at 1.28%, JTBC at 1.08%, and Channel A at 0.95%.

Looking at the broadcaster asset disclosure data for the same period, TV Chosun received an average annual content usage fee of 38.2 billion KRW from pay broadcasters. In contrast, MBC received 99.3 billion KRW annually on average, which is 2.6 times more than TV Chosun. SBS, which had the same viewership rating as TV Chosun, also received more than 2.5 times the content usage fees. Although MBN's viewership rating was close to 77% of MBC's, the amount of money it received as content fees was only 38% of MBC's.

Status of Paid Broadcasting Content Usage Fees in the Past 3 Years [Data Provided by the Office of Assemblyman Ha Young-je]

Representative Ha said, "Looking at the average viewership ratings over the past three years, TV Chosun has grown to a level comparable to SBS and has significantly surpassed MBC, but it has not received content fees commensurate with this." He added, "Terrestrial broadcasters are receiving excessive content usage fees regardless of viewership ratings, which are a measure of content quality. It is necessary to resolve the imbalance of resources in the broadcasting ecosystem and foster it healthily through reasonable principles for determining fees."