Riga, Oct 1 (LETA) - The government on Tuesday approved the media policy guidelines for 2024-2027, which pledge to promote public information literacy and media literacy, strengthen local media and improve the safety and skills of journalists.

The authors of the document, promoted by the Culture Ministry, stress that the aim of the guidelines is to strengthen the sustainability of the Latvian media environment and to promote the independence, safety and quality of the media environment. As the guidelines were drawn up after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, media policy in this context is closely linked to the security of the information space.

Culture Minister Agnese Lace (Progressives) pointed out that for many years the media sector had been left without its own policy planning document, which makes it particularly important that the approved guidelines for media policy 2024-2027 were drawn up in close cooperation with the sector. "We have placed particular emphasis on media independence, security and self-regulation, as well as on efforts to reach out to minorities in Latvian. There is still a lot of work to be done to finalize the action plan to achieve the goals set out in the guidelines and to fight for additional funding in the political priorities in the coming years," said Lace.

At the government meeting, Transport Minister Kaspars Briskens (Progressives) and Defense Minister Andris Spruds (Progressives) expressed their satisfaction and gratitude for the cooperation with the Culture Ministry in preparation of this important document.

Justice Minister Inese Libina-Egnere (New Unity) pointed out that the objective enclosed in the policy guidelines is very "comprehensive and important".

The new media policy sets out four directions of action. The first is aimed at a strong Latvian media environment and information space, where the public media reach out to a wide range of different groups in society with quality informative, educational and entertaining content. It also requires that the media are financially independent and able to sustain their core activities.

This includes tasks such as ensuring the development of public service media by bringing funding levels closer to the European average, making the funding model more independent and transparent, and promoting outreach to different sections of society. It also aims to improve the operating environment for commercial media by improving media support mechanisms. In parallel, it is planned to promote a more Latvian media environment by increasing the use of the Latvian language in the media.

The second direction is a secure media environment, where media outlets have developed business continuity plans and are able to provide the Latvian public with up-to-date information in a crisis situation. It also ensures that the population has the skills, knowledge and understanding to use the media effectively and safely, and that media literacy skills have increased.

To make the media environment safe, it is planned to strengthen the safety of journalists and media professionals by raising public and judicial awareness of the work of journalists and the dangers, as well as to prepare the media for crisis situations by promoting the development of media business continuity plans. 

The third direction aims at an independent media environment, where the media in Latvia are free, independent and free from self-censorship. Citizens also have easy and direct access to information about media owners.

This direction defines objectives such as strengthening the independence of institutions that monitor the media environment and strengthening the independence of journalists by improving Latvia's ranking in the World Press Freedom Index. In parallel, it is planned to promote media self-regulation, thereby strengthening media independence and freedom. The tasks also include a plan to change the funding model for public service media, ensuring predictability of funding growth.

The fourth direction is "quality media environment", where media provide content in line with high professional standards of journalistic quality, accountability and ethics. It also aims to promote lifelong learning for journalists and media professionals, the quality of journalism and the raising of professional standards. In parallel, it ensures that citizens have access to quality content.

In order to achieve the objectives of this action line, it is planned to support the lifelong learning of media professionals and the integration of young media professionals into the media environment. In parallel, it is planned to understand the media environment in Latvia through regular research to make data-driven decisions, and to promote media quality by supporting professional organizations and educating media professionals.

It is envisaged that the tasks defined in the guidelines will be implemented within the allocated budgetary resources. The planned funding is EUR 55.306 million in 2024, EUR 77.679 million in 2025, EUR 67.665 million in 2026 and ER 66.695 million in 2027.