Brussels, 20 September 2010 – The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) – the leading association of national media organizations in the world – took note of today's publication of the Commission's Radio Spectrum Policy Programme (RSPP) for the strategic planning and harmonization of the use of spectrum in Europe.

The EBU welcomes the Commission's commitment to respecting the cultural, social and economic values of spectrum in line with the EU Telecom Package rules and looks forward to working with the EU Institutions on spectrum management.

As a first comment on the newly published text, the Director General of the EBU, Ingrid Deltenre, said, "Terrestrial broadcasting is in many countries the main way to distribute broadcasting services reaching millions of households. Broadcasters need to secure universal terrestrial free to air broadcasting as part of their remit. We should be able to offer our viewers the same quality of services and features as on other platforms. Future developments such as HBB should not be slowed down because of the lack of availability of spectrum".

She went on to say that, "Any discussion on the digital dividend for other services should be limited to the 800MHz band. Any further reduction beyond the 800MHz band would have negative consequences on the diversity and quality of broadcasting services, increasing interference levels, and restricting the universal availability of free to air services". 

In particular, according to the EBU, interference issues to broadcasting services and consumers still need to be taken into account in the RSPP.

Overall, the EBU encourages the Commission to address spectrum needs, especially for wireless broadband, in a comprehensive manner, taking into account all relevant frequency bands, technology developments and market conditions.The

European Broadcasting Union (EBU) serves 86 national media organizations from 56 countries in and around Europe. 

The EBU represents its Members and promotes the values and distinctiveness of public service media in Europe and around the world. The Eurovision and Euroradio networks deliver news, sports, events and music to EBU Members and other media organizations. 

Services to Members range from legal advice, technical standardization and development to co-production and exchange of quality European content.  

For more information about the EBU: http://www.ebu.ch/