Arab Media Outlook

The Dubai Press club has just released its third Arab Media Outlook edition, Arab Media Outlook 2009-2013: Inspiring Local Content. AMO is a media development initiative of the Dubai Press Club; others includes the Arab Media Forum and the Arab Journalism Award. The 199-page Report assesses the region's media landscape, aiming to" build a knowlege-base on the media for the media for the benefit of industry stakeholders, policy makers, media scholars, students and the general public."

The report this year is far more exhaustive in its scope and reach than the previous editions and is backed for the first time, by extensive market research in four significant media markets in the region, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Lebanon on shifting media consumption habits. We have expanded the coverage of the report to include 15 Arab countries, namely, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Sudan, Tunisia, the UAE and the Yemen.

The last edition of the report came out soon after the onset of the global financial crisis, leaving out little scope for incorporating a detailed analysis of its impact on the media industry. We have tried to more than compensate for that in the present edition, providing a much more focused assessment of the media industry against the backdrop of the financial meltdown. The impact of the crisis, needless to say, varies from country to country, depending on the extent to which each market is exposed to global markets. The country-wise assessment given in the report takes into
account the specificities of each market covered.
--Steven Aftergood, Secrecy News