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South African television viewing - the percentage of people watching television in the country - is increasing, largely driven by SABC1 and more rural viewers who watch TV.
That's according to the South African Advertising Research Foundation (Saarf) that just released the brand-new AMPS data, December 2010 (January to December 2010) that represents 13,3 million households in South Africa where 84% of households now have access to a television set in the home and which is up from 82% since the previous survey's data, AMPS June 2010, was released last year.
In South Africa TV viewing is increasing. AMPS Dec 10 shows that 88,5% of all South African adults now watch television in any given week, up from 86,8% in the previous survey. Television viewing has increased especially in settlements and rural areas and especially in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo. According to AMPS Dec 10, the driving force behind the overall ascendance of the medium was SABC1.
• SABC1 grew its weekly viewership (the percentage of people who indicate they've watched something on the channel within a 7 day period) from 75,6% to 76,8%. The SABC1 audience grew in settlements and rural areas in Limpopo, but the channel lost ground in the Western Cape.
• SABC2 remained stable at 66,8%, with growth in East London.
• e.tv viewership remained stable at 66,2%.
• SABC3 remained stable at 54,7%, growing in settlements and rural areas, and in the North West.
• M-Net is at 6,5%, declining in the Northern Cape.
• DStv in total (excluding terrestrial channels such as SABC/e.tv) now stands at 20,2%, growing in large urban areas and in the Free State.
I asked Saarf about TopTV that started its commercial pay TV service in May 2010. Mpho Mokone, technical support executive at Saarf tells TV with Thinus that TopTV can't be included in the full year AMPS data yet, but will be soon.
TopTV was only incluced for the first time in the AMPS questionnaire from July to December 2010, while the AMPS Dec 10 cover a full 12 month period. TopTV has only been on the AMPS questionnaire for 6 months. ''New entrants on the AMPS questionnaire for 6 months are published in the 6 month report that will be released later this year. TopTV will be included in this report.''