Botswana ment radio station. The market will eventually determine what will happen. Overall, there is no political will on the part of the government to improve the existing media environment. This can be attributed to mistrust of the private media on the part of politicians. Government is not giving any consideration to the support of small and struggling media as is being done in South Africa, for example, through the Media Diversity Development Agency. The proposed broadcasting policy suggests that a fund be set up to help the independent broadcasting sector to survive. At present CEDA provides relatively cheap loans to the independent media. SCORING: Individual scores: 2, 1, 2, 2, 3, 2, 2, 2, 2 Average score: 2.0 2.10 (2005 = 1.2) Private media outlets operate as efficient and professional businesses. ANALYSIS: Most private media outfits are operating efficiently and as professional businesses. In the print sector, compared to the poor quality of the government news products, standards are high and this has enabled private papers to retain their share of the market. The quality of radio programming seems to have gone down in order to control operating costs. There has been increased diversification, especially in the telecommunications (e.g. headline news via SMS) and local music sectors. However, these have been increases in volume mostly while quality 24 African Media Barometer - Botswana 2007