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PARLIAMENT
EMPOWERS ETHNIC MEDIA
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The first ever UK ethnic trade body, Multi Ethnic Media Owners Association, MEMOA, was launched in Parliament last week to support multi ethnic media owners from the Afro-Caribbean, African, Asian and Turkish communities.
The meeting was hosted by David Lammy MP at a House of Commons reception, sponsored by Urban Market Consultancy of the Glen Yearwood Group,
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David
Lammy, MP for Tottenham and Minister for Culture believes that the multi-ethnic media must not be underestimated.
He said: “I’m delighted to be able to host this opportunity for owners of the ethnic minority media to meet with Labour MPs, Lords, and Government Ministers at the House of Commons.
“The networks and the power which will accompany a truly multi-ethnic British media cannot be underestimated, because your organisations have the ability to communicate rapidly and with an accurate picture of how things are on the ground because of those community links, an asset which is invaluable to the British media at large.”
Lammy added: “It is right that the multi ethnic media has proper access to government, that it is able to share good practice, and that it is able to come together as a forum despite serving different communities.”
Also present at the launch was Chancellor Gordon Brown. He acknowledged the important contribution of ethnic media to the media industry, and supports the association objectives.
He said: “This event is an important first and a significant event in the media. I applaud your dynamism and your contribution to this country, which will grow and grow.”
Glen Yearwood, founder of MEMOA, hopes to lobby leading UK advertising executives and encourage the “ethnic consumer.”
Yearwood also owns the Urban Market Consultancy, which takes messages from the mainstream and disseminates these messages or information to ethnic media owners.
At one point, Urban Market Consultancy was not receiving marketing budgets which Yearwood felt was reflective of the value of ethnic media.
He believes advertisers are not reaching other ethnic groups and this needs to change.
The founder of MEMOA, Glen Yearwood told The Fusion Voice how the MEMOA was initiated, and why there is a clear need for this type of support. He believes that MEMOA wants to be part of a solution as oppose to contributing to the problem.
He said: “Ethnic media owners themselves were not being valued or receiving advertising revenue to reflect the worth of their customers. A conference was called in White Chapel, where 23 media owners were invited and talked about ways forward.
“In September last year, it was agreed that we [Urban Market Consultancy] should setup a media association to represent the minority ethnic media owners with a single voice. This is where MEMOA derived from.”
“This year, we are at a major crossroads for cultural understanding in this country, and given the legacy that we don’t have a trade association to pull together for diverse grouping of media owners, MEMOA in that sense, stands for good things.”
Yearwood and members wants MEMOA to lobby and raise the profile of the multi ethnic consumer, who is an important part of British mainstream consumerism.
The problems which can stem from the media, the people responsible with placing advertising revenue, also assume that the value of the ethnic media consumer is in some way limited.
“Our job is to conduct research which actually sums up the value of the minority consumer,” the founder said. “This will tells us something about the diary of media consumption habit.”
“For example, in the morning I would listen to radio 4, radio 5 in the evenings as I have a passion for football. However, on the weekend I would listen to a black community station as I have a cultural need that can be satisfied by culturally sensitive media.”
Future plans of MEMOA will be work with the advertising industry and clients to ensure that they can understand the value of the BME consumer.
MEMOA’s aim is to develop new research, which will analyse the diary of media consumers by the BME consumer.
Credit: Massy, the fusion
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