NHK suffers major licence fee deficit
January 10, 2025
By Chris Forrester
Japan’s NHK public broadcaster is in trouble for the third year running suffering from a shortfall in licence fee payments.
NHK’s 2025 fiscal year will post a deficit of some 40 billion Yen (€245m) according to The Japan Times. While this is a major shortfall, the sum is an improvement on the 2024 position which ran to a 57 billion Yen shortfall.
NHK says will make up the shortfall by using reserve funds. “It is rushing to implement structural reform to overcome the fee cut and make ends meet in fiscal 2027,” says the local report.
For fiscal 2025, NHK estimated operating revenues at 603.4 billion Yen, up 0.2 per cent from the previous year, with income from the viewing fees, which accounts for most of its operating revenues, down 0.2 per cent, reflecting a decline in the number of subscribers.
Operating expenditures were put at 643.4 billion Yen, down 2.4 per cent, as a result of a review of programming production costs.
The fiscal 2025 budget includes 18 billion Yen for online distribution, below the existing ceiling of 20 billion Yen. But it separately includes ¥2.9 billion for related investments such as app development.
Japan’s Broadcasting Act licence fee for terrestrial reception is 13,600 Yen per annum and a total of 24,090 Yen for reception of both terrestrial transmissions and satellite signals.