ABC audiences around Australia and across the Indo-Pacific region will directly benefit from the increase in funding announced in the federal budget.

The increase of A$83.7 million (US$54.2 million) in operational funding and $32 million for international services across four years ($20.9 million and $8 million each year respectively) will allow significant investment in services across all platforms.

It will also help the ABC to deal with rising costs affecting the media industry and support the sustainability of ABC services, ABC News reports.

The government followed through with its pre-election promise to restore A$83.7 million in funding to the national broadcaster. The money was cut by the previous government in 2018 and saw the ABC cut 250 jobs.

Both the ABC and public broadcaster SBS will move to five-year funding terms from July next year from the current three-year terms.

The government said this would “better safeguard the independence of the national broadcasters, as well as support long-term strategic planning and innovation in high-quality content provision and service delivery, across Australia”.