SECTOR 4 4.9 Media professionals have access to training facilitates offering formal qualification programmes as well as opportunities to upgrade skills. Traditional qualification programmes are offered at the University of Conakry (Kountya Institute). Private universities also offer courses in journalism (Aboubacar Camara Foundation, Mercure University, Nelson Mandela University and Koffi Annan University). The main difficulty with training in Guinea is the lack of qualified teaching staff. Courses are often run by retired news presenters or retired trainees. This, as panelists from the media sector pointed out, explains the very low standards. It will thus be necessary to improve the quality of training to ensure that new blood will continue to flow into the journalistic profession. The content of the courses taught in the above institutions is determined without input from the media sector or regard to its needs, but students are being sent on internships to media houses. This traditional, formal training is supplemented with training offered by NGOs and some private initiatives in the form of short, well-targeted seminars. However, these only concentrate on journalism skills and ignore other aspects such as media management. For media houses to be sustainable, this type of know-how is necessary. When private broadcasting kicked off such more broad-based training was offered, with a course schedule initiated by the UNDP and spearheaded by the RFI. The bulk of the staff of private broadcasters underwent this training. Scores: Individual scores: 1 Country does not meet indicator 2 Country meets only a few aspects of indicator 3 Country meets some aspects of indicator 4 Country meets most aspects of indicator 5 Country meets all aspects of the indicator Average score: 2.4 (2008 = n/a ; 2006 = n/a) AFRICAN MEDIA BAROMETER GUINEA 2011 117