International Radio Personality of the Year
By Alan TristramRadio New Zealand’s Kim Hill is the 2012 International Radio Personality of the Year.
The announcement was made at an Association for International Broadcasting (AIB) ceremony in London attended by senior executives, producers and journalists from radio and television organisations around the world.
The gala event celebrated ‘global media excellence.’
Judges described Kim Hill as: “an experienced and warm broadcaster exercising full control of her content whilst coaxing her guests to reveal more of themselves; really
enjoyable live and sparky content that demonstrates what is great about radio and illustrates how important lightness of touch is in speech content”
Simon Morton highly commended
There was added recognition for Radio New Zealand when Simon Morton was highly commended in the radio documentary category for his Christchurch earthquake
programme, Broken River, which earlier in the year won a Gold Medal at the New York Festival.
The AIB awards cover the best current affairs and documentary productions across a wide range of genres, celebrating creativity and rewarding achievement in
factual programming.
They are unique in world media and are judged by an international panel of industry professionals — including producers, editors, journalists, writers and critics.
Radio New Zealand Chief Executive, Peter Cavanagh, received the award on behalf of Kim Hill, and acknowledged the outstanding achievement of New Zealand’s world class
broadcaster.
“To be named Radio Personality of the Year in competition with the best in the world is an outstanding achievement,” he said. “Kim has been a household name in New Zealand for many years but with the advent of on-line broadcasting, Radio New Zealand is now a global broadcaster and with this award, Kim has received the international recognition she so
richly deserves”
He also noted the additional international recognition for Simon Morton.
“This high commendation for Broken River follows the award of a Gold Medal in New York and is a fitting tribute to world class programming from Radio New Zealand,”he said.
Simon Spanswick, head of AIB, emphasised the quality of the award entries.
He said: ”The range of entries in this year’s AIBs was outstanding and our judges had a challenging time in evaluating and selecting the winners. We’ve seen
broadcasters investigating hugely important issues both at home and abroad, excellent and courageous journalism.”
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