DUSHANBE, February 13, Asia-Plus — On Friday Febraury 15, the OSCE Center in Dushanbe will host a roundtable meeting, which is expected to bring together newspaper managers and editors to study and discuss the research on factors of costs of producing newspapers in Tajikistan, which was prepared by Mirsaid Sultonov, lecturer at Russian-Tajik Slavonic University has prepared research on factors of costs of producing newspapers in Tajikistan.
The research, which considers technical, economic and organizational problems affecting profitability of Tajikistan’s newspapers, is part of the OSCE-supported project to study the economic difficulties faced by Tajikistan”s print media.
The study identifies the high production costs and newspapers” inability to attract enough advertising as a main reason for their lack of profitability, as the costs cannot be recouped by sales alone. Many state print media rely on subsidies and state-supported subscription campaigns.
We will recall that the research was presented at a press conference at the OSCE Center in Dushanbe on December 19, 2007. During the press conference it was noted that most newspapers in Tajikistan are not profitable, according to new research presented today at a news conference at the OSCE Centre in Dushanbe.
Speaking to journalists at a press conference, Mirsaid Sultonov said that just a handful of the country”s main newspapers are profitable, while the rest are struggling. “Most Tajik newspaper managers are journalists by profession, but they lack managerial skills. Therefore many do not take advertisements seriously and have poor administrative management,” he said.
