Small World: International factual programming on public service channels

This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the UK’s Public Service Broadcasters (PSBs) in covering global events through current affairs and other factual programmes on television channels. To achieve this, we analysed the volume, originality, scheduling, genre, and geographic focus of international (non-news) factual programmes broadcast on the main seven UK public service channels – BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Three, BBC Four, ITV 1, Channel 4 and Channel 5 – in 2023 and 2024. We find that international factual programmes were very heavily concentrated on a small number of countries. Two thirds of international factual programming in our sample focussed on just 15 countries – with the USA, Italy and Spain receiving the most coverage – primarily in the form of travelogues. By contrast, 35 countries experiencing humanitarian crises
collectively received just 6.5% of all international factual programming across both years.