TVP profits not affected by slump in TV advertising

Polish public television TVP SA, made a net profit of zl. 31.7 million last year. In spite of a crisis in the TV advertising market and lower revenues from advertising TVP managed to triple its profits as compared to 2000. In 2001 the number of those paying license fees went up, which meant net income from this source increased to zl. 509.5 million from zl. 474.7 million in 2000, but the increase in profits mainly arose from reducing costs from zl. 1.8 billion to 1.6 billion. These reductions hit emissions of cultural programs and TV Polonia. At the same time TVP put more money, zl. 91.6 million, into producing films for TV. Compared to private TV stations, these financial results are not spectacular, for example, TVN, last year made a profit of over zl. 100 million. However, as Tomasz Bardzialowski, an analyst from Credit First Suisse Boston remarked, maximizing profit is not a priority for public television. (Puls Biznesu, pp. 1, 3; Rzeczpospolita, p. B3) A.D.