Study on broadening participation under the creative Europe media programme : final report

The overall aim of the study was to identify the key national and regional support measures aimed at increasing the capacity of the European audiovisual (AV) industries and to review the impact of these measures on facilitating the AV operators' access to MEDIA funding. The study also assessed the European added value of MEDIA measures and proposed how to maximise it during the remainder of the programme to promote a more level playing field in the European AV ecosystem. More specifically, the study had the following objectives: Identify and map national and regional support measures that aim to strengthen the AV industry's capacity. Cluster countries according to the type and size of the available measures and identify actual or potential correlations between the availability of national support measures and AV sector capacity. Assess the extent to which MEDIA measures have strengthened the AV capacity of supported operators and enabled them to upscale their activities alone or in combination with national support measures. Provide recommendations on MEDIA measures that are the most relevant to promoting a more level playing field while maintaining a high quality of applications, balanced access to MEDIA funds and achieving the general and specific programme's objectives. Propose feasible, relevant and robust indicators for categorising MEDIA-participating countries in groups A or B of the so-called low-capacity counties (LCCs). The scope of the study covered MEDIA measures of the current Creative Europe Programme (2021-2027), primarily focusing on data collection and analysis in the first two years of programme implementation. The study covered all the AV sub-sectors supported by the MEDIA strand falling within the main stages of the AV product lifecycle, namely the development, production and distribution of AV works. The measures considered included grants, tax incentives, rebates, levies, direct investment obligations, quota obligations, as well as broadcaster and streamer investments.