Canadian Broadcast Standards Council Unveils New Multilingual Brochure - Launch of Cultural Communities Outreach Program

TORONTO, May 23, 2003 - The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) today unveiled a new brochure that will enable the organization to serve a greater proportion of the Canadian public by reaching out to citizens whose language of comfort is not English or French. The brochure, which describes CBSC services and provides pertinent extracts from Canada's broadcasting codes, has been translated into 15 languages.

"This brochure is a tangible example of the Council's commitment to serve all Canadians," said Ron Cohen, the National Chair of the CBSC. "With this valuable new tool, and the other elements of our outreach campaign, we are going to ensure that a greater number of Canadians are able to express any concerns they might have about potentially offensive content on Canadian broadcasting. It is hard to think of a more appropriate place to release the brochure than at the Innoversity Conference, which itself is aimed at building community bridges."

The funding for the translation and the production of this brochure was provided by OMNI Television (which is owned and operated by Rogers Broadcasting Limited), which recognized the need for more accessibility to the CBSC process.

The brochure has been translated into Arabic, Chinese, Dari, Greek, Hindi, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Italian, Portuguese, Punjabi, Pushto, Somali, Spanish, Tamil and Ukrainian. Copies will be distributed through stations that are members of the CBSC, community organizations, government departments, and from the CBSC's national office.

It is part of a larger outreach program, which will see the brochure translated into other languages, as well as the introduction of multilingual content on the CBSC website, increased contact with various communities across the country, and other initiatives.

"Canada's private broadcasters are committed to the principle of reflecting our nation's cultural diversity, and the CBSC is pleased to be able to help them achieve that objective. In the months ahead, we look forward to working with broadcasters across the country as they continue to deliver high quality programming to all Canadians," Mr. Cohen concluded.

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All CBSC decisions, Codes, links to members' and other web sites, and related information are available on the CBSC's website at www.cbsc.ca. For more information, please contact the CBSC National Chair, Mme Andrée Noël CBSC Executive Director, John MacNab