Radio Australia finishes Pacific expansion with Marshall Islands launch
A new FM transmitter means residents of Majuro atoll are the latest listeners to join the network, which has doubled in two years and now extends to 25 locations across the region. Audiences in Majuro can now tune into ABC Radio Australia on 106.7FM.
The launch is the final part of an expansion which kicked off with Ghizo Island in the Solomon Islands in September 2023 and has been rolled out to the Federated States of Micronesia (Pohnpei), Palau (Koror), Nauru, Kiribati (Tarawa), Tuvalu (Funafuti), Cook Islands (Rarotonga), Auki in the Solomon Islands and three additional Papua New Guinea locations, in East New Britain (Kokopo), Manus Island (Lorengau) and the Autonomous Region of Bougainville (Buka).
Radio Australia now has a network of transmitters in the Pacific, like this one in Tarawa, Kiribati.
Head of ABC International Services, Claire Gorman, hailed the project as a "landmark success".
"In the 85 years since ABC Radio Australia first broadcast across the region, the network has undergone significant changes with this latest expansion in transmission sites," she said.
"This represents the next chapter for ABC Radio Australia, providing new audiences with our slate of trusted news and Pacific-focused radio programming."
ABC Radio Australia Manager Justine Kelly said teams had been working hard for two years to deliver the project.
"We are proud to be available across even more locations throughout the Pacific as our talented team of presenters and comprehensive suite of shows, share the incredible stories and voices from across the region," she said.
The full radio service offers listeners an extensive schedule of bespoke programming covering the latest in news, music, sports, culture, health, science and faith.
Tumultuous times for broadcasters
The completion of the project comes after a tumultuous few months for independent media in Asia and the Pacific.
US President Donald Trump slashed funding to multiple media organisations including Voice of America, Benar News and Radio Free Asia earlier this year, which risked leaving millions of people across the region without access to independent news.
The US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which funded these organisations, employed roughly 3,500 people and had an $US886 million budget before it was gutted.
Aleksandra Bielakowska from Reporters Without Borders told the ABC at the time the cuts "threaten press freedom worldwide" and were a "gigantic gift" for authoritarian regimes in Beijing and Moscow.
As VOA director Michael Abramowitz, said: "For the first time in 83 years, the storied Voice of America is being silenced.''
The project began with the launch of Radio Australia in Gizo, Solomon Islands, in 2023. ( Radio Australia )
The state of the media in the Pacific
The State of the Media: Pacific Region report found that, despite advancements in the Pacific media sector, it remains fragile in the face of digital disruption and additional loss of advertising revenue due to the COVID-19 pandemic, creating an existential crisis.
The study found there had been a sharp increase in internet access across the region over the previous decade. In Samoa, for example, internet access had soared from 7 per cent in 2013 to 75 per cent in 2025.
It also found misinformation and disinformation were bigger challenges in larger countries such as Fiji, Solomon Islands, and Samoa, which have active diasporas and higher penetration of foreign media sources, particularly on social media platforms owned by big tech companies.
There were also concerns about media freedom which influenced audience trust in mainstream media, particularly government-owned media organisations.
Why an independent voice is important
Radio Australia was launched at the start of World War II to counter propaganda from the Axis powers.
For decades it provided an independent news service in multiple languages to people across the region.
Around a decade ago, Australian government budget cuts forced ABC Radio Australia to wind down its coverage and services to focus solely on the Pacific and Timor Leste.
ABC technicians install a transmitter in Nauru.
With extra funding in 2022 and 2023, it has been able to expand the footprint and the amount of content designed for Pacific audiences.
This international broadcasting is important as it can break stories and hold power to account across the region, in a way that local media at times may not be able to.
ABC Radio Australia also supports local radio services by providing relevant valuable content for local audiences and can tell uniquely Pacific stores. It also acts as a counterweight to anti-democratic information and disinformation.
Indeed, when the US government cut funding to its broadcasters, authoritarian regimes including Beijing-backed media celebrated the decision, while activists and analysts warned the closures would create information "black holes" that could be filled by Russian or Chinese services.
There are multiple ways to listen to ABC Radio Australia across the Pacific – live via internet streaming, through 24-hour FM stations in your area, or by catching up with full episodes on ABC Pacific online.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
ABC News
an hour ago
- ABC News
Government working toward helping banned Meta users raise complaints
Anfas Azad spent six years and more than $80,000 in digital ads building an Instagram page for his online jewellery business, which he operated from Brisbane. In July, he was banned from all Meta-owned platforms for allegedly breaching its community standards. Over 6,000 of his followers were gone in an instant. Without a retail store or other means of interacting with potential customers, Mr Azad essentially lost his livelihood. "A jewellery business is all about trust, and to see years of work just crumble for no clear reason or fault of your own is devastating." Instagram said Mr Azad breached Meta's standards on child exploitation, abuse and nudity, but it did not say which post or actions breached the platform's rules. "It's a very serious issue and I haven't done anything as such," he said. "I still don't know what exactly happened … It's embarrassing and it's insulting." Mr Azad is one of dozens of Australian users to have contacted the ABC to say they were falsely accused of breaching Meta's standards — including its child abuse rules. Many say their businesses were up-ended and their personal lives were deeply affected, but there is no functional way of appealing the account bans because users are directed to automated processing systems. The Australian government has responded by saying it has taken steps to address the way major digital providers operating in Australia handle internal disputes. The ABC understands that the Australian government wrote to the Digital Industry Group Inc (DIGI) and major digital platform providers operating in Australia in February 2024. It requested a voluntary internal dispute resolution (IDR) code to help users raise issues and get better outcomes, including with regard to the loss of their online accounts. An IDR code is a set of guidelines — voluntarily agreed to by industry members — for handling complaints. "The Australian Government is working with the Digital Industry Group Inc (DIGI) and major digital platform providers operating in Australia on a voluntary internal dispute resolution code to help users raise issues and get better outcomes, including loss of accounts," a government spokesperson said. It is understood that Australia's digital industry association is in the process of finalising this code, and the government will monitor the outcomes of this process. In the meantime, banned users like Mr Azad feel helpless. "What can I do? There's nobody to speak to, there's nobody to contact," he said. "This could happen to absolutely anyone, and there is no protection. Meta seems to be above the law. "I don't think it should be allowed for business pages to just be taken down like that." Users across the globe have also raised this issue, with nearly 37,000 people signing a petition blaming Meta's "broken AI enforcement systems" of wrongfully banning accounts. They say the only way to speak to a human is to pay for Meta Verified, and even then, many say the support team is unhelpful. Desperate to speak to a customer representative, Mr Azad said he contacted Meta's marketing department, but they stone-walled him. "They simply said, 'There's nothing we can do, this is not our department, we are only in charge of advertising,'" he said. "And when I asked who do I contact to explain my situation, they said, 'Sorry, there is nothing we can do, we are only in advertising,' and they don't redirect you to anyone. "The irony is, even though they are human beings, they speak to you in a loop like robots." Meta acknowledged in July that a "technical problem" had caused the wrongful suspensions of some Facebook groups, but it denied its platforms were more widely affected. A spokesperson did not answer previous ABC questions about why it wrongly accused another Australian user of violating its policies. Within hours of the ABC contacting the company about the case, Meta reinstated the banned account. The ABC has contacted Meta again about Mr Azad's case. The tech giant has not commented on claims that Meta's AI is to blame for unfairly banning people. Instagram states AI is central to its "content review process," and Meta has outlined how technology and humans enforce its policies. In July, Meta said it was taking "aggressive action" on accounts breaking its rules. It reported the removal of about 635,000 Instagram and Facebook accounts for sexualised images or comments related to children under 13. Meta's wide-ranging policy on child sexual exploitation has changed three times since December 2024. Mr Azad's Instagram account was disabled on July 18, which coincides with one of the dates the company made amendments to its policy. Meta has not said what impact, if any, these changes had on the cases the ABC has raised with it.
News.com.au
4 hours ago
- News.com.au
Sydney families flee due to staggering average cost of houses
It's the huge cost of buying a home in Sydney that's sending families fleeing Australia's largest city and as interest rates tumble, it's a problem that's about to become even worse. According to the latest predictions, the median house price in Sydney is forecast to jump by another 7 per cent in 2025-26, to a staggering $1.83 million. That's nearly twice the value of the average home in Australia, which has surpassed $1 million for the first time, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Those figures mean that the typical house price in Sydney will rise by $112,000, which is more than the average full-time worker earns before tax ($103,000). By comparison, the median house price in Melbourne is tipped to rise by 6 per cent, to $1.1 million. However, that's after two years of downturns in the Victorian market. As business leaders, economists and political leaders gather in Canberra for Treasurer Jim Chalmer's economic roundtable, it's a question that is at the heart of the push to overhaul planning approvals to build more houses and even consider new options including modular homes. Finance Minister Katy Gallagher was hit with the big question on Monday morning, conceding it is a huge problem. 'By mid-next year the median house price in Sydney, according to forecasts, is expected to hit $1.8 million,'' ABC host James Glenday said. 'The median full-time worker earns about $90,000. How can people under the age of 40 get excited about productivity and making the economy efficient when they can't afford to buy a home?.' Senator Gallagher said the problem was longstanding. 'That is exactly the discussion that needs to be had around housing and for us it is around the fact that we haven't built enough houses for decades in this country and the fact we have to look at how we speed that up and how we offer a range of housing options for people,'' she said. 'Whether that be from looking at how we deal with the supported housing sector or affordable housing all the way to home ownership. 'We went to the election with policies around that. There is more work we have to do. It takes too long to build a house. That adds to the cost of housing. We have to make sure we are tackling these issues, otherwise these problems will continue.' For many Australians, it's a case of voting with their feet. According to the Muval's Family Relocation Report — based on over 41,000 family moves across Australia over the past six years — there are now more families leaving Sydney than moving there. Despite huge flows of migrants, Sydney City and Inner South with a netâ€'negative family migration of 0.18, followed by Melbourne Inner (0.23), Sydney's Eastern Suburbs (0.32), Parramatta (0.42) and Inner West (0.45). 'Greater Sydney has experienced the highest loss of families, with a ratio of just 0.31, meaning that for every family that moved in, more than three have moved out,' the report revealed. 'This may reflect the city's soaring cost of living, rising property prices, and a growing desire among families for more space and less congestion.' All of the regions where more families are moving out than moving in were in Sydney, Melbourne and the ACT. 'Meanwhile, affordability pressures are driving major shifts in ownership: nearly 17 per cent of families are going from owner-occupier to renter, while just 6.3 per cent are moving in the opposite direction — a stark reminder of how tough homeownership is becoming for many.' Last week, a leaked Treasury document revealed a number of recommended outcomes for the federal government's productivity round table. The pre-written list, prepared for cabinet, revealed advice from the Treasury to pause changes to the National Construction Code. It also recommends measures to speed up housing approvals, including a national artificial intelligence plan to cut environmental red tape. A suite of reforms is designed to clear a backlog of 30,000 housing approvals currently being assessed under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity (EPBC) Act. The Housing Industry Association (HIA) has urged Treasurer Jim Chalmers to take urgent action. The HIA's submission to Treasury highlighted the taxes and charges on a typical house and land package in Sydney can now exceed $500,000 adding huge imposts on family mortgages. 'The Treasurer's roundtable presents a critical opportunity to address the barriers that are holding back new housing supply. You cannot talk about productivity, economic growth or improving living standards without discussing housing,' HIA managing director Jocelyn Martin said. 'Red tape, regulation and delay are adding enormous costs to the delivery of new homes. If we want to see real reform, we need to boost productivity in our industry, cut the burden of unnecessary building and planning rules, and start making it easier to build homes.'
Sky News AU
a day ago
- Sky News AU
Opposition's big call on union's push for four-day work week
The opposition has dismissed calls for a four-day work week as an 'ambit claim' from unions, but says it is ultimately up to employers. The Australian Council of Trade Unions this week announced they would push for a shorter work week at the Albanese government's Economic Reform Roundtable. The ACTU argued working four days would boost productivity, pointing to recent research from more than 140 organisations across Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Canada, the UK and the US. It said that it would share productivity gains more fairly with workers and improve living standards. Opposition industrial relations and employment spokesman Tim Wilson said on Sunday the ACTU was not serious about it. 'This is just an ambit claim from the trade union movement,' he told the ABC. 'We know it's an ambit claim because only a few months ago, the unions shut down a pathway where the retail industry, again, actually applied to introduce a pathway for a four-day working week. 'The unions were the one who shut this down.' He said if ACTU chief Sally McManus 'really believed that this was such a good idea, she would introduce it across all the people who work for trade unions across the countries'. Though, he added that employers were free to set arrangements as they liked with their employees. 'If work employers and employees want to come together and negotiate arrangements that suit them, that's a very different thing from what Sally McManus is proposing, where they're seeking to legislate these sorts of proposals which they aren't even adopting themselves,' Mr Wilson said. 'That's what workplace flexibility means. 'It means coming together to get the best outcome for workers and employers, to advance economic productivity and improving standards of living for every Australian.' Anthony Albanese and his senior ministers have said the government is not working on a policy for a four-day work week. Instead, they put the focus back on flexible work arrangements through enterprise bargaining. Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Amanda Rishworth earlier said it was one of many 'different ideas' feeding into the roundtable. 'What I would say is what I hear and what the unions and businesses have often put forward, is making sure that there is flexibility around caring responsibilities, work-life balance, which is really key,' she told Sky News. 'Which is why, in the Secure Jobs Better Pay Bill that passed the parliament last term, there is the right to request flexible arrangements – that could be location, that could be hours. 'You have the right to do that if you are balancing family and care responsibilities.' Originally published as Calls for four-day work week a ruse, opposition says
