Round Tahi update
Our first funding round of the new financial year, Round Tahi, has just closed with a huge number of applications and combined total funding ask.This round is for Targeted and General audiences, and the annual (closed) funding round for Platforms.
In Round Tahi we have had a total of 165 applications seeking over $82 million. Last year at this time we had 156 applications seeking $66m.
Of those 165 applications, 89 are for Non-Fiction, seeking over $36m and 39 are for Scripted, seeking $22.5m. In this round we have earmarked $13m for Non-Fiction projects, $7m for Scripted projects. We also received 25 Platform funding applications and 12 Industry Development Fund applications. Funding decisions will be notified as below:
- Children's round - 1 June
- Round Tahi - 7 July
Special Scripted round
A note also that we have a Special Scripted round due to open 29 June, with a deadline of 4.00pm 20 July and decisions notified 22 September.
The timing of this round has been deliberate to take into account an expected decision from government about eligibility of domestic productions to apply for the NZ Screen Production Grant alongside NZ On Air funding.
Additional funding
We continue to get a lot of questions about the additional $10m funding being provided to NZ On Air in the 2023/24 financial year.
We are still considering the most impactful way to use this funding, that acknowledges it is one-off and aligns with the expectations expressed in the Cabinet paper, specifically that we support the creation of ...
“innovative content to reach new audiences… to deliver trusted public media news, information and entertainment through cross-sector collaboration. Its aim will be to reach groups who are currently under-represented across the media system (such as Māori, Pacific, Asian, rangatahi and children) including new initiatives for tamariki that parents, caregivers and educators can trust.”
These funds will be applied to future rounds or possibly specific Requests for Proposals (RFPs) but they have not been applied to the current round.