The SABC has no plans to broadcast the 2010 Fifa World Cup in high-definition (HD) for South Africans.
The national broadcaster says the games will not be broadcast in HD on digital terrestrial television (DTT). Instead, Host Broadcasting Services (HBS), a Swiss company, will film the games in HD for other countries.
"The 2010 Fifa World Cup will be covered in HD by HBS," says SABC group spokesman Kaiser Kganyago. "If we did broadcast in HD, viewers would need an HD decoder and this is not being discussed for DTT at this point."
The national broadcaster previously acquired an HD outside broadcast unit, for R50 million, that was supposed to be used for a washed out cricket game between SA and India, in November 2006. The SABC had planned to purchase more broadcasting units by 2010, since it had won the bid to broadcast the games.
Africa Analysis media analyst David Moore says he would be surprised if the SABC could not broadcast the games in HD.
"SA will have the ability to broadcast a digital signal by the end of this year. And sending out an HD signal over the digital transmission network would be possible. Even though HD may not be prevalent in SA by 2011, the outgoing signal to the rest of the world would have to be both HD and standard definition (SD)," he notes.
Moore also says the Fifa local organising committee will pressure the government into funding SABC or Sentech to be able to broadcast an HD signal.
"If, on the very small chance, SA was unable to transmit the tournament in HD, it would be seen as an embarrassment. Watching SD signal on an HD TV set is not pleasant, especially if you're used to the better quality picture."
Analysts have stated that countries usually implement DTT as their digital platform long before considering a move to HDTV. SA is likely to do the same. Yet to move to DTT, Sentech says it needs R300 million in funding from government to create a DTT network.
Earlier this month, Cabinet green-lighted the digital migration policy and announced it will subsidise the bulk of the cost of set-top boxes for five million people, at a cost of R2.45 billion.
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