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Vlaamse Radio- en Televisieomroeporganisatie
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The communications tower at the headquarters of VRT / RTBF in Brussels, the Reyers Tower.
The Vlaamse Radio- en Televisieomroeporganisatie (Flemish Radio and Television Broadcasting Organisation), or VRT (Dutch: [ˌveːjɛrˈteː]), is the national public-service broadcaster for the Flemish Community of Belgium.
History
VRT is the successor to the Nationaal Instituut voor de Radio-omroep (NIR, 1930–60), Belgische Radio- en Televisieomroep (BRT, 1960–1991), and Belgische Radio- en Televisieomroep Nederlandstalige Uitzendingen (BRTN, 1991–1998). The NIR (known as the INR in French) and BRT (RTB in French) had each been single state-owned entities with separate Dutch- and French-language production departments. However, in 1977, as part of the ongoing state reform in Belgium broadcasting became reserved to the language communities rather than the national government in 1977. Accordingly, BRT/RTB went their separate ways in 1977. While the former French half changed its name to RTBF in 1977, the Dutch side retained the BRT name until becoming BRTN in 1991. However, the two broadcasters share production facilities on Auguste Reyerslaan (French: Boulevard Auguste Reyers) in Brussels.
The final renaming to VRT, on 1 January 1998, followed a change in the organization's legal status: from being part of a semi-governmental entity (a parastatale in Belgian terminology) it had, on 16 April 1997, became a publicly owned corporation (NV van publiek recht) in its own right.
As successors to the NIR/INR, VRT and its counterpart in the French Community of Belgium, RTBF, share the Belgian membership in the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) – an association of public broadcasters in the countries of Europe and the Mediterranean rim that, amongst other activities, organizes the annual Eurovision Song Contest.
With the ending of its television monopoly – marked by the creation of VTM, a commercial television company that initially captured more than half of VRT's audience – the public broadcaster has been compelled to fight back, and part of its successful response has been the use of external production houses such as Woestijnvis, the creator of such formats as The Mole (De mol) and Man bites dog (TV series) [nl] (Man bijt hond). |