Dear AMARC Members, partners, and supporters,

The 2^nd AMARC Asia Pacific Regional Conference has been postponed to February 20-23, 2010. The event was scheduled to take place from 10-13 October 2009. The location of the conference remains unchanged and will be held in Bangalore, India. The organisers made this decision to enable more people to participate in the conference so that the community radio movement in the region is consolidated and strengthened.

One of the main objectives of the regional conference is to create a platform for AMARC members, representatives of governments, donor communities and other stakeholders to learn from each other's experiences and build a stronger community radio movement in the region. Developing clear strategies and action plans is very important for positively influencing the development of community broadcasting and this can be ensured only through the participation of a greater number of members and supporters.

We want to ensure that the regional conference acts as a forum of convergence among national and sub-regional community radio organisations and the larger AMARC network. The decision to postpone the conference honours requests from a number of country level and international partners for additional time to better articulate internal consultations and strategies. Clarity in terms of national strategies and goals are vital for building regional strategies and the additional time received from the postponement is expected to help us achieve that.

The regional conference aims to support the emerging sectors of community broadcasting in the host country, India, as well as across the region. This will be achieved by presenting reports on existing models of community broadcasting in other countries with a view to providing a solid framework for the future of community radio in India.

Updated conference registration details can be found at:

http://asiapacific.amarc.org/index.php?p=2_Conference_Asia_Pacific_2009.

The AMARC Asia Pacific regional conference promises to be one of the most important regional consultations for advancing freedom of expression and community development though the use of community broadcasting.

Consultations and workshops will be held on a variety topics including 'content development for good-governance and sustainable development’, ‘media freedom, freedom of expression, right to information, and communication rights, ‘media diversity: identity, inclusion, innovation and reconciliation’, ‘managing for sustainability', ‘access, participation and equality in community radio and empowerment through community radio,’ and 'community radio’s role in addressing global and local Issues.’ The conference will also hold a number of parallel training workshops covering content creation for social issues and introduction to technologies. To discuss these and other pertinent issues, community radio broadcasters, activists, researchers, academicians, donors, and policy makers will be present.

Please find the draft agenda of the conference attached. For further assistance, please write to the conference coordinator at [log in to unmask].

____________________
Suman Basnet
Regional Coordinator
AMARC Asia Pacific
Kathmandu, Nepal

Phone: +977 1 5554811

Fax: +977 1 5521714
www.asiapacific.amarc.org