20 December 2006 - 900’000’000 TV viewers for Archery

900’000’000 TV viewers for Archery Lausanne - 20 December 2006  Thanks to the success for the Meteksan Archery World Cup and the Field World Championships, the International Archery Federation (FITA) is pleased to announce that an estimated 900’000’000 people watched Archery on television in 2006.   FITA has produced and distributed through the EBU newscast and 26 or 52 minutes highlights on each event, i.e. the four World Cup stages, the World Cup Final at the Mayapan pyramids and the Field World Championships in Göteborg. The Final was also broadcast live.   The global cumulative audience is calculated so far in 2006: - With news coverage : 565’000’000 viewers - With live, highlights or features : 324’000’000 viewers - Total :889’000’000 viewers    With the year-end programming, the audience should reach the 900 millions.   This has been a successful come-back for Archery on television with the success of the new World Cup. FITA has set up its own FITA TV with the company HTR in Geneva for the live, the highlights and the newscast, which have reached about 100 territories. Moreover, Gillette World Sport, Sports Unlimited and Trans World Sport have broadcast feature stories on each event. The archery TV images were most watched in Asia and Europe, especially in India, China, Russia, Italy, Turkey and France.   The main TV channels that showed archery include ESPN Star Asia, Eurosport, Fox International, Sport+, Zee Sport, RAI, RTR Russia, TRT or CCTV.   FITA has also launched its web TV on time for the World Cup: www.archery.tv   Didier Miéville FITA Communication Director