Singapore’s Mediacorp has received S$380 million/US$293 million a year in government funding for the past five financial years to support broadcast services in four languages, the Ministry for Digital Development and Information (MDDI) told Parliament this week.

MDDI said this was lower than the annual funding of approximately S$750 million/US$579 million allocated to the national broadcasters of Finland and Denmark, which have similar population sizes to Singapore.

Answering questions about ratings and comparisons over the past five years, MDDI said measurement had shifted from TV alone to broader reach across all Mediacorp’s platforms and social media platforms.

“This is keeping with the domestic audiences’ changing consumption habits and Mediacorp’s broader network strategy. For example, Mediacorp’s TV reach dropped by about 10% over the last decade or so, but unique video viewers on [streaming platform] meWATCH has increased by about 80% in the same period,” MDDI said, adding that public satisfaction with Mediacorp has held steady, at more than 75% across this time period.

Mediacorp reaches more than 90% of the local population through its owned and operated platforms as well as social media platforms.