Portugal

[PT] Prime-time news lacks minority representation and gender balance in Portugal

IRIS 2025-2:1/16

Elsa Costa e Silva

Universidade do Minho

The prime-time news on Portugal's main free-to-air television channels tends to favour news on political and international topics. A recent report issued by the Portuguese Media Regulatory Agency on pluralism and diversity in television news has also found that the most viewed cable TV channel prioritises news on internal affairs. While the public broadcaster's main TV channel adds sports to the top three most important topics, the other two commercial channels prefer internal affairs. As for the second public TV channel, cultural topics constitute the main thrust of the coverage.

Although the main TV channels tend to concur in the same dominant themes, prime-time news services are diversified, the most diverse being the one provided by the commercial channel TVI. International coverage grew in 2023 due to the armed conflicts between Ukraine and Russia and between Israel and Hamas, also drawing the attention of audiences to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Prime-time news lacks, however, geographical diversity and representation. Most coverage refers to the national territory without specifying particular regions of the country. And when a particular region is mentioned, it is primarily the area of the capital (Lisbon). The islands (Madeira and the Azores) and the regions of Alentejo and Algarve receive very little attention from the leading news services. The exception to this pattern is the cable channel CMTV news service, which presents greater geographical diversity, following a logic of closer proximity to its audiences.

In terms of pluralism and diversity in gender, again, the prime-time news services lack a balanced representation, with male sources representing between 70 and 81% of the total news sources. TV channels also lack representation in terms of migrants and ethnic, religious, or cultural minorities, either in terms of news sources or in terms of the central protagonists of the pieces of information.

This report analyses 30 segments from RTP1, SIC, TVI and CMTV, and 29 segments from RTP21, selected through a sampling that ensures the inclusion of news from all months of the year 2023. The sample comprises 3952 pieces of information. Pluralism and diversity are assessed in the following dimensions: main topics covered, geographical approach, sources, and protagonists.