Maputo — The Mozambican government's "Made in Mozambique" campaign took an ambitious step forward on Friday with the announcement that "Made in Mozambique" will soon launch an Internet television channel.

The channel, "tvmozambique.net", is owned by the company "AR-Broadcasting Mozambique", which is a vehicle for the 199 Mozambican companies which have been awarded the "Made in Mozambique" stamp by the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

The technological platform required for the online TV channel has been purchased from the Portuguese company "Grande Porto TV", which is also providing training for staff of AR-Broadcasting.

The Director of Communications and Strategy for "Made in Mozambique", Antonio Durao, told a Maputo press conference that the purpose of the new channel will be to promote Mozambique, its products and its people throughout the world. It was hoped that the channel will provide greater international visibility for the "Made in Mozambique" companies.

Valdemar Morais, of Grande Porto TV, said the platform could provide 10 Internet TV channels, each of them with "sub-channels". There could be news, culture, sports and tourism channels, each running for 24 hours a day.

Journalists at the press conference wanted to know where the content for these channels would come from. Morais spoke of "Mozambican content", but the harsh reality is that the four existing Mozambican TV stations are heavily dependent on imported material (Brazilian soap operas, European football matches, and Hollywood films, for example).

The putative launch date for tvmozambique.net is 20 February, but AR-Broadcasting concedes that this deadline will not be met.

The entire project will depend for its funding on advertising revenue from the "Made in Mozambique" companies. On their generosity will depend the number of people that AR-Mozambique is able to employ.

Source: Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)