Preparing Independent Russian Media for the 21'' Century:

Final Report on Cooperative Agreement 1 18-A-00-97-00274-00, December 2000 page 30
4.1 Summary of Results
SERVICE (MBDS)
"No nation is so poor that it cannot afford afree press.
In fact, the poorer you are, the more you need a free press. "
Surin Pitsuwan, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Thailand
"In my opinion, the newspapers are equal to the courts - and
sometimes ahead of the courts zn our system - In protectzng the
people's fundamental rlghts "
Robert F Kennedy
"The newspaper is an institution developed by modern civzlizatlon to
present the news of the day, to foster commerce and zndustry through
widely circulated advertisements and to furnish that check upon
government which no constitution has ever been able to provlde "
Col. Robert McCormick, founder of the Chicago Tribune
In April 1998, the National Press Institute formally inaugurated its Media
Business Development Service (MBDS) to provide management and business-
development assistance to non-state regional newspapers across Russia. In many
respects, the MBDS was a logical successor to the ground-breaking work that NPI had
begun under the USAID-funded Media Development Program and NPI's other media-
management training since 1993. The basic goal was to create a permanent newspaper
management resource and a community of non-state newspaper publishers and managers
in order to make NPI, as Volgograd publisher Yefim Shusterman said, "a strategic
partner for the independent press."
During the Cooperative Agreement period, NPI implemented the following
projects:
Legal consultations to 250 media organizations in 55 Russian cities and
establishment of a network of 120 media lawyers throughout the country;
Legal training of 150 media professionals through a series of 12 seminars;
Intensive, on-site management consulting for 84 newspapers;
Establishment of a listserv - especially designed for non-state regional newspaper
publishers - that brought together, by June 2000, 880 local and regional newspaper
publishers, who received practical information such as comparative newsprint
prices, pertinent announcements, and a range of recommendations and links;
Center for War, Peace, and the News Media - NYU Chapter 4: Media Business Development Service