The third Irish Language Broadcast Fund qualitative audience research report, carried recently by Millward Brown Ulster in Northern Ireland, has revealed a it’s results including the significant rise in the number of viewers who feel that Irish language programmes encourage their interest in the language.
The research was carried out within the ILBF constituency: the general Northern Ireland population; key stakeholders and trainees.
Of the general Northern Ireland population 59% of those who watch Irish language programming feel that it encouraged their interest in the Irish language (an increase of 17% from the last report).
Results did not change in relation to the opinion of programme quality with 50% of those who watch Irish language television output still rating it as either very or fairly good.
Among the Irish speakers, 43% of respondents rated the education value as high and 48% rating their cultural value as high.
40% of respondents who understand Irish and/or watch Irish language television output feel there is a need to increase the of Irish language programming available in Northern Ireland.
100% of the stakeholders that took part in the report rated the ILBF remit as significant to the development of Irish language broadcasting. The same figure was true for the stakeholders who considered it important to have Irish language television financed and broadcast locally. 95% of stakeholders interviewed rated as significant the relevance of the ILBF remit to the Northern Ireland television industry generally.
100% of the trainees were satisfied with the content of the ILBF funded training scheme while a minority of trainees (17%) believed they could have acquired the same skills to the same level elsewhere.