Twelve ABU members presented a rich and diverse sample of their programming as a highlight for this year’s virtual meeting of the ABU Radio Working Party. The meeting started with ABU Director Programming Yasu Nagahata, RWP Chair Claire Gorman, and Vice Chair Widhie Kurniawan welcoming 126 participants, the largest number to-date.

Projects presented in the showcase segment of the Zoom meeting started with a program from NHK Japan dedicated to the sounds of railways and concluded with a special feature about songbirds made by All India Radio with guest ornithologists from Ireland and Scotland.

In-between, RTM Malaysia featured a special series of COVID-19 information featuring a comic hero Captain Zeal the Virus Slayer; FBC Fiji showed how it was connecting to listeners at markets & community events; China Radio International showcased its 12-part podcast “Decoding the Art of War”, a modern take on the classic text by Sun Tzu; RRI Indonesia featured its work on distance educational help for disabled students; ABC Australia reported on its Pacific program “Sistas Let’s Talk”, made for women by women and fronted by Papua New Guinean host Hilda Wayne; TRT Turkey explained how its special programming about road rules was helping to cut the horrific death tolls on roads in Turkey and around the world; Shanghai Media Group’s He Xin spoke movingly of their special documentary by a reporter accompanying medical teams into the heart of the COVID outbreak in Wuhan; VBTC Vanuatu showed how its news service interacts with audiences spread across radio, television and online platforms; Voice of Vietnam demonstrated how its Mekong FM service linked more than 20 million people across the Mekong Delta; and NBT sent everyone off at the end with a musical number “Let’s have some fun”.

The RWP also featured three stand-alone segments covering diverse areas of radio broadcasting – a report by Shannon Bosshard of ARN NeuroLab on his research into how audio interacted with listeners’ brains; an interview with Karalaini Koroi, Program Director and Presenter at FBC Fiji, on being the first recipient of the Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS) Radio Content, Management and Leadership fellowship; and a demonstration of RAI Italy’s newly reconfigured audio offer RAIPlaySound by Andrea Borgnino.

A full report will be available in the ABU News Magazine.