East Radio

Started on 28 October 1992, East Radio (ER)—the full name is Shanghai East Radio Broadcasting Station (http://www.eastradio.com/)—is the first provincial government broadcasting station in mainland China, which was separated from the existing provincial government broadcasting station and thus is in competition with the latter. Its broadcasting is therefore more active, various and interesting while involving a lot of very intense political propaganda.

ER owns four channels: News Round-up Programmes (Xinwen yu zonghe jiemu) at MW 792 KHz and FM 104.5 Hz; Music Programmes (Yinyue jiemu) at FM 101.7 Hz; Finance Programmes (Jinrong jiemu) at FM 97.7 Hz; and Children and Adolescent Programmes (Shao er jiemu) at FM 92.4 Hz. Broadcasts total ninety-two hours per day.

Transmitted by the East Pearl Transmitter Tower (Dongfang mingzhu guangbo dianshita) located in Pudong, Shanghai, the highest such tower in Asia, ER’s programmes cover not only Shanghai but also the whole of Zhejing and Jiangsu provinces and most of Anhui reaching a population of approximately 150 million.

Some well-known programmes have been developed in the recent ten years, such as East Calling (Dongfang chuanhu) and Daily Requests (Tiantian dianbo). A second music channel, run by ER, was established on the Shanghai cable television station.

ER established an Internet website (www.eastradio.com) in 1999, where one can listen online to all the programmes on the four channels. ER also owns a traditional instruments orchestra, commonly regarded as of high quality.

WANG XIAOMING