Radio Canada International
Radio Canada International (RCI) is the international broadcasting service of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). Prior to 1970, RCI was known as the CBC International Service ("CBC IS"). The broadcasting service was also previously referred to as the Voice of Canada, broadcasting on shortwave from powerful transmitters in Sackville, New Brunswick. "In its heyday", said Radio World magazine, "Radio Canada International was one of the world's most listened-to international shortwave broadcasters".[1] However, as the result of an 80 percent budget cut, shortwave services were terminated in June 2012, and RCI became accessible exclusively via the Internet. It also reduced its services to five languages (in contrast with the 14 languages it used in 1990) and ended production of its own news service.[2]
Type
Maison Radio-Canada, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
February 25, 1945
Voice of Canada (informal, 1945), CBC International Service (1945–1970)
International
On December 3, 2020, RCI announced that its staff was being reduced from 20 to 9 (in contrast to 200 employees in 1990)[3] and that its English and French language sections would close and be replaced by curated content from the domestic CBC and Radio-Canada services. RCI would also begin offering online services in Punjabi and Tagalog.[4] The changes went into effect on May 19, 2021.[5][6]
History[edit]
The early years (1942–1953)[edit]
The idea for creating an international radio voice for Canada was first proposed as far back as the 1930s. Several studies commissioned by the CBC Board of Governors in the late 1930s had come to the conclusion that Canada needed a radio service to broadcast a Canadian point of view to the world.
By the early 1940s, this need was also recognized by a series of Parliamentary Broadcasting Committees. Finally, in 1942, Prime Minister William Lyon MacKenzie King announced that Canada would begin a shortwave radio service that would keep members of the Canadian Armed Forces in touch with news and entertainment from home. The CBC International Service became a reality with the signing of an Order-in-Council on September 18, 1942.
Station[edit]
Interval signal[edit]
RCI's interval signal was the first four notes of O Canada played on a piano, followed by "Radio Canada International" pronounced in English, and then French.
CBC-SRC's archived stories on RCI
Historical
Lobby groups