Vietnam News Agency General Director Tran Mai Huong said multimedia was becoming an inevitable trend for the survival of news agencies and Asia-Pacific news agencies should cooperate on developing a multimedia platform on which they can share their products.
Addressing the 14th General Assembly of the Organisation of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) which was held in Istanbul, Turkey from Nov. 24-27, Huong called on OANA to make adjustments in line with developing technologies and the information accessing habits of media consumers.
“We are facing greater and more challenging competition as a number of our traditional key clients – some print newspapers – have already disappeared,” Huong said.
“However, multimedia becomes an inevitable trend for the survival of news agencies and our VNA, like other fellow news agencies, in on that track,” he added.
He called on OANA to cooperate on developing a multimedia platform on which member agencies can share video clips as they have done so far with text news and photos.
“With this, member agencies can reduce production costs and raise prestige, as well as deliver more lively messages about our own countries,” he said.
On the sidelines of the assembly, a cooperation agreement between Vietnam News Agency (VNA) and Mehr News Agency (MNA) of Iran was signed by VNA General Director Huong and MNA Director General Reza Moqadassi.
The cooperation agreement is aimed at diversifying news sources and promoting professional cooperation between VNA and MNA. It lays a foundation for information exchange and professional cooperation, particularly for exchange of video clips and TV programmes in the English language which are of great importance in the present digital and mutimedia age.
The two sides also pledged to extend their cooperation to all international forums at which they are represented.
The agencies attending the assembly and its parallel meetings of the 32 nd Executive Board Meeting (EBM) and the Editorial and Technique Committee Meeting (ETBM) were representatives from Asia-Pacific news agencies, as well as from media organisations in the Mediterranean and the Balkan regions.
The assembly aimed to assess achievements and implementation of activities put forward at the 13th OANA General Assembly held in Jakarta, Indonesia, in December 2007. The participants discussed and adopted the Istanbul Declaration which, among other things, spelled out the need for OANA members to increase cooperation in light of globalisation of information and developments taking place in cyberspace. The assembly also discussed ways of strengthening the mechanism for exchange of news, information and visual content between member agencies.
Participants stressed the importance of adopting multimedia in a world of global digital changes, the need for news agencies to stay aware of new trends and challenges in the era of new media, and to look for innovative ways to reach target audiences. They said these can be achieved partly through more OANA cooperation.
During the assembly, two seminars on the themes, “The future of news agencies in the digital age” and “The role of news agencies in the dialogue among civilisations and cultures” were also held with the participation of Bulent Arinc, Turkey’s Minister of State and Deputy Prime Minister and many other Turkish officials.
Hilmi Bengi, the Director General of Anadolu Agency of Turkey, assumed the presidency of OANA at the conclusion of the assembly and Anadolu will serve as its secretariat for the next three years.
The Trend News Agency of Azerbaijan and National Iraq News Agency were accepted as the 42nd and 43rd members of the organisation.
The 15th OANA General Assembly is scheduled to take place in Saudi Arabia in 2013./.
Addressing the 14th General Assembly of the Organisation of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) which was held in Istanbul, Turkey from Nov. 24-27, Huong called on OANA to make adjustments in line with developing technologies and the information accessing habits of media consumers.
“We are facing greater and more challenging competition as a number of our traditional key clients – some print newspapers – have already disappeared,” Huong said.
“However, multimedia becomes an inevitable trend for the survival of news agencies and our VNA, like other fellow news agencies, in on that track,” he added.
He called on OANA to cooperate on developing a multimedia platform on which member agencies can share video clips as they have done so far with text news and photos.
“With this, member agencies can reduce production costs and raise prestige, as well as deliver more lively messages about our own countries,” he said.
On the sidelines of the assembly, a cooperation agreement between Vietnam News Agency (VNA) and Mehr News Agency (MNA) of Iran was signed by VNA General Director Huong and MNA Director General Reza Moqadassi.
The cooperation agreement is aimed at diversifying news sources and promoting professional cooperation between VNA and MNA. It lays a foundation for information exchange and professional cooperation, particularly for exchange of video clips and TV programmes in the English language which are of great importance in the present digital and mutimedia age.
The two sides also pledged to extend their cooperation to all international forums at which they are represented.
The agencies attending the assembly and its parallel meetings of the 32 nd Executive Board Meeting (EBM) and the Editorial and Technique Committee Meeting (ETBM) were representatives from Asia-Pacific news agencies, as well as from media organisations in the Mediterranean and the Balkan regions.
The assembly aimed to assess achievements and implementation of activities put forward at the 13th OANA General Assembly held in Jakarta, Indonesia, in December 2007. The participants discussed and adopted the Istanbul Declaration which, among other things, spelled out the need for OANA members to increase cooperation in light of globalisation of information and developments taking place in cyberspace. The assembly also discussed ways of strengthening the mechanism for exchange of news, information and visual content between member agencies.
Participants stressed the importance of adopting multimedia in a world of global digital changes, the need for news agencies to stay aware of new trends and challenges in the era of new media, and to look for innovative ways to reach target audiences. They said these can be achieved partly through more OANA cooperation.
During the assembly, two seminars on the themes, “The future of news agencies in the digital age” and “The role of news agencies in the dialogue among civilisations and cultures” were also held with the participation of Bulent Arinc, Turkey’s Minister of State and Deputy Prime Minister and many other Turkish officials.
Hilmi Bengi, the Director General of Anadolu Agency of Turkey, assumed the presidency of OANA at the conclusion of the assembly and Anadolu will serve as its secretariat for the next three years.
The Trend News Agency of Azerbaijan and National Iraq News Agency were accepted as the 42nd and 43rd members of the organisation.
The 15th OANA General Assembly is scheduled to take place in Saudi Arabia in 2013./.
