Netherlands

[NL] Government Stimulates Production of Videoclips

IRIS 2006-3:1/31

Rosa Hamming

Institute for Information Law (IViR), University of Amsterdam

On 1 February 2006, the Secretary of State for Culture, Medy van der Laan, announced that in the next three years an amount of EUR 600,000 will be made available for the production of videoclips. This initiative is part of the action programme “Culture and Economy”, which is meant to stimulate the creative industry with direct funding and by reducing existing obstacles. One of these obstacles is the gap between the creative sector and other sectors.

Because of this gap the creative sector has almost no access to private funding and there exists a lack of entrepreneurial spirit. As a result, the economic opportunities for the creative industry are not exploited adequately. The Cabinet wants to tackle this obstacle because it considers creativity to be a fundamental element of the modern knowledge economy. Culture and creativity are of great importance for the economy and could stimulate the development of new ideas and technologies. By providing a subsidy for the production of videoclips, the Government aims to stimulate the cooperation between musicians and visual artists in making videoclips of high quality, which can then be used to promote the Dutch artists and their CDs at international level. The Fund for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture will develop a plan for the practical implementation of the subsidy and carry it out in cooperation with the media, because the media can allow for maximum distribution of the videoclips by ether, cable and the internet. It is hoped that this will help the creative industry to become one of the leading industries in the Dutch economy.