CO537-5142 — Page 105

CONFIDENTIAL.

UNITED KINGDOM TRADE COMMISSIONER

P.0.Box 528.

Uktrade Hongkong"

M/122/851/48.C.

Overseas Trade "B" No.267.

Copied to:-

M.S.Henderson, Esq., Counsellor (Commercial),

Lisbon.

Economic Intelligence, Foreign Office, London. Political Branch, Foreign Office, London. G.F.Tyrrell, Esq., H.M.Consul-General, Canton.

The Under-Secretary,

Commercial Relations & Exports Department, Board of Trade,

Millbank, London, S.W.1.

306 Queen's Building,

HONG KONG,.

18th August, 1949.

For the attention of Miss T.W.M. Brunsdon.

Sir,

Commercial Radio and United Kingdom Exports.

i

As you will know, Radio Hong Kong operates under the Post- master-General, transmissions being 845 k/cs. and 640 k/cs. with short wave transmissions on 9/52 megacycles. The range is limited, it possesses a limited budget and at present undertakes no commer- cial programme.

2.

3.

In my despatch 0.T."B" No. 238 of 12th July on Macao, I advised of the plans afoot there to develop a 10 k/w radio station with time devoted to commercial programmes.

valued at 4-500,000 patacas The latest position is that the equipment therefor/has arrived from R.C.A., America, and it is hoped to commence operations between October 1st to 15th next. Mr. Edwin Dunham, Programme Director of the National Broadcasting Corporation, U.S.A., is on somo nine months' leave of absence to set up the station. Three U.S.A. radio experts are there to staff it, Mr. Daniel Sutter, N.B.C. announcer and writer, Mr. Don Kerr, announcer, copy writer and disc jockey of a New Jersey station, and Mr. Mart Wayne, announcer and continuity writer.

*

4.

The station will be controlled by Radio Enterprises of Macao Limited, with R.H. Lobo (Dr. Lobo's son) as manager in con- junction with Macao Government, and a Da Rocha of Libent, Wyndham Street, Hong Kong, as business manager. The latter could be classed as one of the type of out port business men, smart, persuasive and always ready to overstep the limits of normal business ethics.

5.

A 10 k/w power will, I ́understand, give it a radius covering China to say the Yangtze, possibly touching Japan and India.

The general policy seems not to have calculated radio receiver holders so much as to have centered on the plum of 450 million people. I believe that, insofar as the Colony, Macao and Kwangtung Province are concerned; there are estimates of some 100,000 sets operative, and the Enterprises' view seems to be that it will reach the higher income bracket. It will be on the air some 17 hours a day, with 95% of the programmes in Portuguese and

/English.

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