According to NZ on Air's annual measure of local content, things are on the up - although new programme hours continued to decline. Underlying trends though are more revealing of shifts in what's on our screens.
Local content is an indicator of the health of the local TV industry for this survey the local content on six free-to-air channels is counted.
In total a third of broadcast hours (6am - midnight) were local programmes and 36% of the programmes screened in prime time (6pm-10pm) were local.
In 2015 local content on screens increased by 2.4%; however first run local content (new programmes) continued to decline (down 278 hours).
49% of content was a repeat, up from 46% in the previous year. The increase in repeats was largely due to extended broadcast hours on M?ori Television.
There was more new local drama/comedy, 'general factual' and M?ori programming in 2015. News, Current Affairs and Sports programming continues to account for a significant amount of local content, at 43% of the schedule (down from 45%). There were fewer hours of new Entertainment, Documentary and Children's programmes.
At the same time, the proportion of prime time local content funded by NZ On Air increased (from 10% to 13%), reflecting the ongoing constraints broadcasters and programme-makers are facing and reflecting the difficult media environment. Jump onto the NZ on Air site to read the full report.