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The Association for the Protection of Copyright and Related Rights “APOLLO” released an appeal to Moldovan businesses, claiming that the AGB Moldova company, which measures TV audience, has been providing false data, Jurnal.md writes.
APOLLO experts believe that the advertizing and media markets of Moldova are dominated by monopolists. “We paid special attention to measuring the audience of broadcasters. In this regard, we found that audience measurement in our country is conducted by the company named ICS TV MR MLD SRL, which holds a license issued by AGB Nielsen Media Research from Switzerland, known as AGB Moldova on the market, which is also under the direct and immediate control” of businessman Vlad Plahotniuc.
“The wrong data provided by AGB Moldova are used systematically to direct financial fluxes coming from advertizing towards the broadcasters owned by Plahotniuc and other moguls affiliated to the political power,” the association’s appeal shows.
APOLLO members also reminded of a case that occurred in 2009, when PRO TV Chisinau ordered an audit of the system used by AGB Moldova. The audit results showed that the sample and panel of households required by the system did not comply with standards and could not ensure representative data for the entire population of Moldova. In addition, APOLLO representatives claim that about one third of the panel households were selected in violation of the rules provided for this process.
Also, Doru Petruti, Director General of IMAS Chisinau, has recently said to Media Azi that the fact that PRO TV Chisinau never sold advertizing on the basis of the data provided by AGB Moldova tells a lot about the company and its credibility. Moreover, Petruti claimed that AGB head office does not recognize AGB Moldova as its subsidiary. “They pay for the software that they get from AGB,” Petruti mentioned.
Thus, APOLLO experts suggest creating a working group in order to appoint a new company to measure the audience of Moldovan TV stations.
