Baku, Azerbaijan, July 16
By Fikret Dolukhanov – Trend:
Uzbekistan will completely discontinue analogue TV broadcasting until the end of 2018, the Radio Communication, Radio Broadcasting and Television Center of Uzbekistan stated.
According to the information, analogue broadcasting has already been shut down in Tashkent since July 15.
State television channels "Uzbekistan", "Yoshlar", "Sport" and "Tashkent" had been broadcasting in the analogue format.
According to the schedule approved by the governmental resolution in July 2017, analogue TV broadcasting has been stopped in Andijan, Fergana, Namangan and Tashkent regions since Jan. 15.
Since April 15, analogue broadcasting has been discontinued in the Syrdarya region, since May 15 – in Jizzakh region, since June 1 – in Samarkand region, since June 15 – in Bukhara and Navoi regions and since July 1 – in Khorezm region. The disconnection in remote and hard-to-reach settlements of these regions began in July 2018.
In parallel, the largest digital TV broadcasting provider of Uzbekistan, UZDIGITAL TV, is conducting scheduled maintenance (from 01:00 to 12:00) on July 16 – Aug. 14, during which broadcast of the TV channels will be suspended.
A transition from analogue to digital TV broadcasting is being carried out across the world countries. Due to creation of full-fledged digital networks, many countries have already stopped or are planning to stop broadcasting in analogue standards.
Such a transition, however, has a number of difficulties, such as labor intensity, high cost and unprofitable coverage of the broadcast systems of sparsely populated areas; confusion with the choice of the digital broadcasting standard, disorienting both suppliers and buyers of new digital TVs; as well as low advertising profitability of digital TV in the transition phase.
The main problem of transition from analogue TV to digital is the inertness of the population, who does not want to part with the old workable TV sets and purchase digital consoles at their own expense.
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