The Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI) has announced funding of €3.8m for 24 new television projects in the fifth funding round of their Sound & Vision scheme.

53 television applications were received from the sector, a decrease of 71 when compared to the previous round. In this round documentary projects fared well with 58% or €2.2m in funding proposed for documentaries dealing with the arts, biography, culture, history and music. Animation and children’s programming accounted for almost 30% of the funding allocated, with four programme proposals receiving support. Other genres which received funding included adult literacy, drama and sport.

30% of the total fund available was granted to Irish and bi-lingual programmes, and 61% of programmes funded will be shown on public service broadcasters, while the remaining 39% of programmes will be aired on a mix of commercial and community television.

The previous four rounds of Sound & Vision have seen the allocation of a cumulative total of over €40m for television since the scheme’s inception in October 2005. This latest round sees a drop in the overall size of the funds allocated, with €8.5m awarded in the 2007 round. Commenting on the announcement Chief Executive of the BCI, Michael O’Keeffe, said “The amount allocated reflects the reduced funding for the scheme in 2008, now that the backlog from previous years has been allocated. Prior to the commencement of this round we had engaged with broadcasters and applicants to advise them that the backlog had been cleared. Coupled with the fact that programme makers are still in the process of making programmes funded in previous rounds, the decline in the number of applications for this round is not surprising. However the quality of applications continues to rise, as evidenced by the allocation of 35% of the amount requested in the current round, which is up from 25% in round four.”

The deadline for the receipt of applications for the sixth round of Sound & Vision for radio has recently passed and in excess of 200 applications were received.

	Applicant	Project Name	Broadcaster	Genre	€ Award	% of Prog budget
1	Borderline Productions Ltd.	Show me the Mummy	BBC NI	Documentary - History	100,000	41%
2	Paul Flanagan	Funky Lingo	DCTV	Children	60,000	47%
3	Brian Gray	Pushers Out - The Story of Concerned Parents Against Drugs	DCTV	Documentary - History	60,000	46%
4	Bill Tyson	The House	DCTV	Adult Literacy	220,000	79%
5	The Media Co-op /Near fm 101.6	Bunkered Irish Paintball Television	DCTV	Sport	15,000	10%
6	Bill Tyson	Changing Faces	DCTV	Documentary - History	15,000	18%
7	P5TV	The Meath 2008 Charity Cycle Challenge	P5TV	Sport	14,500	89%
8	The Organic Centre & Leitrim Media Centre	Growing in Confidence	P5TV	Documentary - General	36,000	89%
9	Araby Productions	Patrick Collins – Painter	RTE	Documentary - Arts	91,000	69%
10	Waldovision Ltd.	Stanley Woods - Forgotten Hero	RTE	Sport	120,000	80%
11	Jam Media	Roy	RTE	Animation	500,000	10%
12	RTE Television	Out Of Their Skin	RTE	Children	392,000	70%
13	Roy Esmonde	Keep The Home Fires Burning	RTE	Documentary - History	111,000	69%
14	Setanta Sports	Sport Matters	Setanta Sports	Sport	350,000	38%
15	Glass Machine Productions	An Páistí Beo Bocht	TG4	Documentary - Biography	104,000	43%
16	Mac Dara Ó Curraidhin	A Boatload of Wild Irishmen	TG4	Documentary - Biography	100,000	62%
17	Bandit Films	Ag Teacht's Ag Imeacht Uaim	TG4	Documentary - Biography	80,000	80%
18	Telegael Teo	Aifric	TG4	Children	200,000	14%
19	Wildfire Films	Anseo	TG4	Drama	400,000	26%
20	Sonas Productions	Ceol na Réabhlódí	TG4	Documentary - Music	80,000	30%
21	ArkHive Productions	Aicí­d	TG4 / BBC NI	Documentary - Nature	90,000	58%
22	Red Pepper Productions	How the Irish have Sex	TV3	Documentary - Culture	250,000	59%
23	Short Comedy Theatre Company	The History of Irish Comedy	TV3	Documentary - Culture	220,000	88%
24	Sideline Productions	Living with Murder	TV3	Documentary - General	250,000	51%

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