CMF embarks on cross-country consultation to meet with stakeholders

Toronto – August 06, 2013 - The Canada Media Fund (CMF) will embark on a cross-country consultation this fall as part of a comprehensive consultation process. The process will comprise a number of components, including focus groups in 18 cities, in all provinces and territories; industry working groups and advisory committees; as well as online consultation.

Feedback received from stakeholders will serve to shape CMF policy moving forward as the two-year program guidelines come to an end and new guidelines are developed for 2014-2015 and beyond.

“The consultation is an important opportunity to connect and have meaningful discussions with our stakeholders” says Valerie Creighton, President and CEO. “These open and frank conversations will help us to continue to meet the needs of the industry and to shape CMF policy. With our stakeholders’ input, we can learn from the CMF’s first three years of operation and embark on the planning stages of how best we can continue to support content creation in Canada. ”

During the focus groups, all CMF stakeholders will have an opportunity to discuss the following issues, amongst others:

• The current policy architecture of the CMF programs with two distinct funding streams: convergent and experimental.
• The activities the CMF now supports such as predevelopment, development, production, marketing, promotion, versioning, etc.; and the expenses currently eligible at these stages.
• The genres and essential requirements that define eligibility for Canadian content.
• Current funding triggers and the relevance of introducing additional triggers.
• The level of support provided by CMF to support a diversity of creative voices and the mechanisms currently employed to this effect.

Focus Groups Preliminary Schedule

Following the focus groups, the CMF will conduct a series of working groups and advisory committees with industry stakeholders to delve more deeply into specific, program-related issues. These include:

Working Groups and Advisory Committees Preliminary Schedule

Pursuant to the focus group, working group and advisory committee meetings, the CMF will convene a meeting of the National Focus Group to report out on the feedback received throughout the consultation process. This group is comprised of representatives from the broadcast distribution undertakings, broadcasters, producers, unions and guilds, private funds, provincial funding agencies and other industry associations from the television and interactive digital media sectors.

The venues and specific times for each event will be communicated as they become available. 

All documents presented and discussed during the consultation process will be posted to the CMF website.  CMF stakeholders are invited to share comments and questions via the CMF website or through our social media accounts on Twitter and Facebook.

For information on the CMF’s programs, please visit www.cmf-fmc.ca.

About the Canada Media Fund
The Canada Media Fund (CMF) fosters, develops, finances and promotes the production of Canadian content and applications for all audiovisual media platforms.  The CMF guides Canadian content towards a competitive global environment by fostering industry innovation, rewarding success, enabling a diversity of voice and promoting access to content through public and private sector partnerships. Please visit www.cmf-fmc.ca.

The CMF’s Canadaonscreen.ca is a website designed to showcase and celebrate Canadian creative talent and content destined for all types of screens, from television productions to games, Web content and software and applications.

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For more information, please contact:

Consultation information:
Marie Marechaux

(514) 496-5995

Media contact:
Pierre Campeau

(416) 554-2768