Radio in New Zealand


began in New Zealand in 1922, and is now dominated by almost thirty radio networks and station groups. The Government has dominated broadcasting since 1925, but through privatisation and deregulation has allowed commercial talk and music stations to reach large audiences. New Zealand also has several radio stations serving Māori tribes, Pasifika communities, ethnic minorities, evangelical Christians and special interests.
State-owned broadcaster Radio New Zealand reaches the broadest range of listeners with bilingual flagship broadcaster Radio New Zealand National. Several previously state-owned radio brands like top-rating talk station Newstalk ZB are now owned by NZME Radio, which operates eight networks on terrestrial radio and iHeartRadio. Ten radio networks are operated by MediaWorks New Zealand, including top-rating music stations The Edge and The Rock. Independent stations like The SkiFM Network, 1XX and Coast FM continue to serve local communities, alongside low-powered and internet stations.
New Zealand was also one of the first countries to introduce Christian radio, with Rhema Media now operating three networks around the country. The Student Radio Network began with the start of bFM in 1969 and the first of the country's community access broadcasters was founded in 1981. Te Māngai Pāho funds Māori iwi radio stations, and the Pacific Media Network continues to receive Government support.

History

Early radio

Professor Robert Jack made the first broadcast in New Zealand from the University of Otago physics department on 17 November 1921. The first radio station, Radio Dunedin, began broadcasting on 4 October 1922, but it was only in 1925 that the Radio Broadcasting Company began broadcasts throughout New Zealand.
Auckland Radio Service started broadcasting at 7:45pm on 13 April 1923 and 1YA was soon being heard on 4 evenings a week as far away as Dunedin. The government facilitated the creation of RBC and gave it a 5-year contract. Auckland Radio was then taken over by the Radio Broadcasting Company of New Zealand on 20 November 1925. A new studio, with a more powerful transmitter and mast, opened on 9 August 1926 in Newton and could be heard in Rarotonga. It cost about £8,500 and used a 500W International Western Electric Company transmitter, able to reach most of the country. RBC's similar 3YA in Christchurch started broadcasting on 1 September 1926. Its 2YA Wellington studio was officially opened on 16 July 1927. Listenership rose rapidly, from 3,588 licences in 1926 to 18,162 in 1927.
Stations in October 1927Location1st licenceOwner
1YAAuckland1923-05RBC
1YB Auckland1923-09La Gloria Gramophone Co
1ZQ Auckland1926-01L.R. Keith
2YA Wellington1923-08RBC
2ZF Palmerston North1925-12Palmerston North Radio Club
2ZM Gisborne1923-10Gisborne Radio Co
3YA Christchurch1923-08RBC
3ZCChristchurch1927-02Finemore Strachan Ltd
4YA Dunedin1923-08RBC
4ZB Dunedin1923-08Otago Radio Association
4ZMDunedin1927-10J.D. McEwen
4ZLDunedin1927-10Radio Service Ltd

In addition to those stations, in 1923 there were also Auckland stations 1AA, 1AB, 1AC, 1AH, 1AM, 2YA, 2AB, Gisborne had 2AD, 2AE, 2AF, 2AG, a 2AG station was also in Whanganui, as was 2AH, 2AI in Wellington, 2AJ in Stratford, 2AK, 2AP 2YK, 2XA, Christchurch stations 3AA, 3AB, 3AC, 3AF, Greymouth 3AD, 4AA, 4AC, 4AD, 4YA was then owned by British Electric Supply and, with 4YO, also in Dunedin, and 1YA had the only three 500 watt transmitters in the country. Further stations in 1926 were 1YC, 1YD and 2YL.
In 1930, station 1ZR began operating from the Queen Street premises of Lewis Eady Limited in Auckland. Pioneer broadcasters included Aunt Daisy, Dudley Wrathall and Rod Talbot. A "radio church", the 'Friendly Road', was run by 'Uncle Tom' Garland and the Reverend Colin Scrimgeour.
In 1932, RBC's assets were acquired by the government, which established the New Zealand Broadcasting Board. This would later be replaced by the New Zealand National Broadcasting Service and the National Commercial Broadcasting Service. In the 1950s, these merged to become the New Zealand Broadcasting Service, a government department. In 1962, this gave way to the New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation, an independent public body modelled on the BBC in the UK.
Until the 1980s, stations used a series of New Zealand call signs, consisting of a single digit and two letters. In addition to YA National programme stations, YC Concert programme stations and a limited number of privately owned X stations, several stations were operated commercially by the government. In each region, the largest city was assigned a ZB station and a ZM music station. The Newstalk ZB and ZM brands continue to be used by NZME. The second largest city was assigned a ZA station: 1ZA in Taupō, 2ZA in Palmerston North, 3ZA in Greymouth and 4ZA in Invercargill. In other towns and cities the final letter was assigned from the town or city name such as 4ZG in Gore and 1ZH in Hamilton. These ZA and other stations, also now owned by NZME, were rebranded as Classic Hits and rebranded again in 2014 as The Hits. 1YA, 2YK, 3AQ, 4YA were the first stations operating in the country's four main cities, and 5ZB was a mobile radio station broadcast in railway carriages during the 1940s.
As part of the Geneva Frequency Plan of 1975, the country switched from 10 kHz to 9 kHz channel spacing on the AM band on 23 November 1978.
The Government deregulated the broadcasting market in 1989, and the number of private stations grew exponentially as a result. Most were locally owned and operated, but eventually became part of the Mediaworks group of stations, and by 2004 the majority of former privately owned stations had been rebranded and owned by the one company.

FM broadcasting

New Zealand's original FM broadcasting allocation, when FM frequencies were first allocated around 1981 until 1986 was 89.0 to 94.0 MHz, and then from 1986, until 2000 was 89.0 to 100.0 MHz. Meanwhile, the segments of the band not used for FM broadcasting, such as the band above 100 MHz had been allocated to land-based AM mobile radio-telephone users, an allocation that dates back to the late 1950s. Prior to the allocation of FM radio frequencies for broadcasting, the entire 88 to 108 MHz band was allocated to land mobile two way radio communications. New Zealand's FM frequency allocation issue was not fixed until the late 1990s, after those users had been progressively reassigned channels elsewhere, when the band was expanded to the full 20.5 MHz. New Zealand now uses the standard global allocation of 87.5–108 MHz for FM. Today, full-power FM stations use frequencies between 88.6 MHz and 106.5 MHz, although the band between 101.8 MHz and 103.3 MHz is allocated to future government, Maori and limited short term broadcasting, it is currently unused. Low-power FM stations use frequencies from 87.6 MHz to 88.3 MHz and from 106.7 MHz to 107.7 MHz. New Zealand permits Radio Data System subcarriers, Radio NZ National uses RDS for its FM network with AF enabled, commercial radio use of RDS for station identification and program information is widespread.
The first station to broadcast on FM in New Zealand was a temporary station in Whakatāne called FM 90.7. The station ran from 5 January 1982 until 31 January 1982. The first permanent station in New Zealand to broadcast on FM was Magic 91FM in Auckland broadcasting on 91.0FM followed by 89 Stereo FM broadcasting on 89.4FM. Both stations are no longer in operation; Magic 91 is the local Auckland frequency for ZM and 89 Stereo FM today broadcasts a simulcasted FM version of Newstalk ZB. Radio New Zealand started broadcasting on FM in the early 1980s and most networks now broadcast on FM. On 22 February 1982, Victoria University of Wellington's student station Radio Active became the first station in Wellington to legally broadcast on FM.

Pirate radio

From 1966, Radio Hauraki broadcast from the MV Tiri that was moored in international waters near Auckland, and in 1968 from the MV Tiri II. This was the only ship-based pirate station to ever broadcast in the Southern Hemisphere which it did for 1,111 days, although it was subsequently discovered that the ship had always been moored in the New Zealand territorial waters off the Hauraki Gulf.
In 1970 it was granted a licence to broadcast from land and a successor company still broadcasts to the Auckland market under the Radio Hauraki brand and is networked nationwide. In 1972, Radio Bosom broadcast briefly until Post Office inspectors found and seized the transmitter which was concealed in a maintenance tunnel under a University of Auckland building. Now known as 95bFM, the station broadcasts legally from the University of Auckland student union building.
Kiwi Radio began broadcasting as 4YZW on 1977, and as WKNZ on the medium wave band in 1978. On 25 March 1980 they launched a pirate Radio Freedom broadcast on both shortwave and FM. In 1983, the name was changed to Kiwi Radio, due to not wanting to be confused with the many other stations named Radio Freedom. Kiwi Radio was known to relay other pirates, such as some from Australia, before it ceased broadcasting in 1997. In 2013, Radio Totse began broadcasting on shortwave to North America on 6.925 MHz.

Public radio

Radio New Zealand

is a New Zealand's state-owned national public service radio broadcasting service. It was formed in 1925, and took on its modern form under the Radio New Zealand Act 1995. The broadcaster is bound by the Charter and Operating Principles included in the Act, which is reviewed by the New Zealand Parliament every five years and was last amended in 2004. The broadcaster is required to provoke debate and critical thought, reflect New Zealand and Māori cultural diversity, cater for varied ages and interests, promote music and drama and create a sense of national identity. It is also a Civil Defence broadcaster.
Radio New Zealand National, formerly National Radio, is Radio New Zealand's general public service broadcaster. It broadcasts flagship news programmes like Morning Report, Midday Report and Checkpoint, alongside morning show Nine to Noon, afternoon show The Panel and a range of interviews and magazine programmes. Radio New Zealand Concert is FM radio network broadcasting classical, jazz, and rock music and regular news updates. The playlist is among the most diverse and eclectic of the world's state run classical music networks. Other services offered by Radio New Zealand include the Radio New Zealand International Pacific shortwave service, the AM Network Parliamentary broadcaster and The Wireless youth website.