FM BROADCAST ENGINEERING TRAINING PRESENTED TO ESCCOM

The Eswatini Communications Commission (ESCCOM) hosted an eight day training course on FM Broadcast Essentials in June 2022 for public and private broadcasters in the Kingdom.

ESCCOM’s Director for Technical Services, Thulani Fakudze, shared that the request for training was based on feedback received during stakeholder consultations with radio stations. The initiatives as driven by ESCCOM were aimed at empowering the broadcast engineering fraternity in Eswatini, along with furthering the quality of service (QoS) provisions by the Commission within the local industry.

Wayne Hattingh, LS of South Africa Training Academy’s subject matter expert, facilitated the course to 20 delegates, representing technicians and engineers working for ESCCOM, Eswatini Broadcasting and Information Services (EBIS), Voice of the Church (VOC) and UNESWA FM. ?

LS of South Africa's Wayne Hattingh conducting 'hands-on' sessions with the course participants.

Course content included radio frequency principles, transmission line matching, linking of sites and studios, telemetry and remote monitoring systems, FM transmitter measurement as well as antenna and combiner training. The course participants also learned how to use the Rohde &Schwarz ETL as the basis of conducting proof-of-performance measurements on FM transmission systems.

Practical sessions being conducted on the Rohde & Schwarz ETL.

The Training Academy believes that the participants gained invaluable theoretical and practical knowledge during the training that could be applied in the day-to-day operations of the broadcasters and would welcome further opportunities to build technical capacity within the broadcast industry.?

Participants who completed the training programme pose for a group photograph!

Article prepared by Dorothea Schutte, Training Academy Manager LS of South Africa