Opinion no. 2014-20 on the performance report for 2013 of the contract of objectives and means between the State and the Institut national de l'audiovisuel
Pursuant to article 18 of the French September 30, 1986 law on freedom of communication, the French Superior Audiovisual Council draws up an annual public report on compliance with its obligations by the public establishment referred to in article 49 of this law (Institut national de l'audiovisuel).
The missions of the "Institut national de l'audiovisuel, a State-owned industrial and commercial public establishment, is responsible for preserving and promoting the national audiovisual heritage" are defined in article 49:
- it preserves the audiovisual archives of national program companies and contributes to their exploitation;
- it exploits extracts from the audiovisual archives of national program companies under the conditions laid down in their specifications;
- it may enter into agreements with any artificial person for the preservation and exploitation of its audiovisual archives;
- in application of articles L. 131-2 and L 132-3 of the French Heritage Code, the Institute is responsible for the legal deposit of radio and television sound and audiovisual documents;
- it contributes to innovation and research in the field of audiovisual production and communication.
2013 marks the fourth year of application of the third Contract of Objectives and Means (COM) covering the period 2010-2014. Within this managerial framework, the institute has focused its efforts on the three main areas defined in the COM:
- safeguarding audiovisuel archives (part I, entitled "a safeguarded and enriched statement of case") ;
- enhancing the value of our collections (Part II, entitled "Enhancing the value of our collections");
- and the transmission of knowledge and skills (part III, entitled "the search for new knowledge").
The COM also sets objectives in terms of corporate management (part IV entitled "reallocation of resources").
In addition, the Institut national de l'audiovisuel (INA) has its own specifications (decree of November 13, 1987, approving the specifications of Radio France and the Institut national de l'audiovisuel). However, this text has never been updated. Only the performance report on the objectives and means contract and the activity report are sent annually to the Board and the two assemblies.
INA's COM performance report for 2013 includes the 21 "strategic" indicators, the five "follow-up" indicators, as well as the results achieved and the means used to achieve them. The Board notes that, overall, the COM objectives have been met. Of the 21 strategic indicators, 13 exceeded their targets, 5 were not achieved and 3 have targets to be met by the end of the COM, in 2014.
2013 was marked by several major developments for the institute: the opening at the end of the year of a professional audiovisual and multimedia training facility in Issy-les-Moulineaux, the launch in March of the revamped INA.fr website, which saw its audience dubbed, and increases in the decentralization of collection consultation (ten multimedia consultation stations were set up in five libraries in Grenoble, Montpellier, Nancy, Bordeaux and Metz). Finally, 2013 saw the integration of a new pricing structure for the marketing of archives. The switch to per-minute pricing has introduced greater flexibility into the grid and improved international development.
I. -Safeguarding archives
In 1999, as part of its first contract of objectives and means, INA launched a Plan de Sauvegarde et de Numérisation Systémique (PSN) (Systematic Preservation and Digitization Plan) with a deadline of 2015, to provide digitized content that could be made available online. This plan concerns 759,408 hours of endangered programs, which are at risk of irremediable physico-chemical degradation within 5 to 10 years, depending on the medium. The plan to safeguard and go paperless continued in 2013, with an increase exceeding the target set. The Institute has moved on from the logic of safeguarding a collection to one of survival conservation of the audiovisuel heritage.
The proportion of holdings threatened by deterioration that were safeguarded digitally was 86%, compared with a target of 83% in the COM for 2013. The aim is to preserve INA's collections against physiological degradation and the obsolescence of the technologies used to exploit them. This preservation takes the form of going paperless for endangered collections.
With regard to the proportion of data secured as part of the PRA "disaster recovery" IT plan, the target of 100% was reached as early as 2012. It measures INA's ability to ensure the continued operation of its applications.
On the other hand, INA is acknowledging a delay of almost 50% in the volume of hours of digital programs migrated to file. Streaming a very large proportion of the audiovisual programs originally stored on analog media to digital format has certainly helped to preserve these collections and make them more accessible. However, the quantitative objective has not been achieved, with 18,716 hours transferred to digital format in 2013, compared with the 39,000 hours forecast in the COM; the means implemented should enable us to achieve the objective in 2014.
Today, INA's audiovisual heritage fund is mainly replenished by the mandates entrusted to the institute, the audiovisual legal deposit and the Internet legal deposit. In order to improve the editorialization of archive holdings, the COM set an indicator to facilitate research and purchases by professionals in a multi-media format. This objective has largely been exceeded. The cumulative number of documentary corpora with a multi-media dimension stood at 95 in 2013, against a target of 70.
To compensate for the sharp reduction in the number of rights it is authorized to market, the institute must continue to seek out new mandates. In 2013, the cumulative number of program hours taken on as exploitation mandates was 11,196 hours, against a COM target of 4,000 hours. Among these new mandates, in 2013 the institute signed an agreement with the Centre Pompidou.
The number of channels captured under the legal deposit of broadcasters in 2013 totaled 115, including 94 TV channels and 21 radio stations. The target set at the end of the COM (120) should be reached. This takes into account the development of the audiovisuel landscape since the early 2000s. With regard to Radio France, whose agreement has just been renewed, the Board is delighted that the archiving of local radio stations in the France Bleu network is now a reality. Lastly, the number of websites captured under the legal deposit scheme is rising steadily, to 9,732 sites, almost 12% more than in 2012.
II. -Promoting collections
As part of its mission to make the audiovisual collections it manages accessible to all audiences, the Institute must in particular consolidate and extend its relationships with broadcasters. In 2013, sales from rights sales amounted to €23.8 million (- 5% compared with 2012), against a COM target of €26.1 million. This drop is of some concern, given that rights sales account for 60% of the company's own resources.
The indicator for the number of certified legal analyses of programs and extracts has been largely met: 30,413, against a target of 28,000 in 2013. The legal capitalization plan (PCJ) contributes to INA's image in its ability to meet its legal and contractual commitments to rights holders.
In 2013, for the first time, the Inamediapro application was made available to a European third-party archive, that of RTBF. The number of hours accessible online for professionals reached 1,050,688 hours, compared with 968,400 hours forecast in the COM. The target set at the end of the COM has thus been reached.
The target for the number of hours accessible to the general public, one of the ambitions of the third COM, has been exceeded, with 40,473 hours compared with 36,685 hours in 2012. The Board welcomes this result, which was one of the Institute's priorities.
With regard to the share of INA productions (54 documentaries produced or co-produced in 2013), the objective of exploiting them on at least two screens reflects the institute's desire to develop the presence of its productions on all media. This share has risen to 80%, with an annual target of 25%.
III. -Communicating knowledge and skills
In 2013, in addition to the overhaul of the professional training supply catalog, a new professional training center was opened in Issy-les-Moulineaux in western Paris. This new INA Expert center is dedicated to training in management, journalism design and audiovisuel law. Of the four COM objectives relating to the transmission of knowledge and skills, two have not been achieved.
INA Sup offers thirteen higher education degrees, three of which are specific to INA. The indicator measuring the creation of initial training courses has not increased since 2009. Despite a target of five research-related courses in 2013, only three have been created, two in musicology and one in science and technology. The financial complexity of implementing these programs and the infrastructure implications seem to explain the failure to meet this target.
Similarly, the target of eight PhD students by 2013 has not been met. Moreover, the number of PhD students has been falling since the start of this COM (4.7 in 2013). The professional integration rate for graduates remains in line with COM objectives, even though it is down sharply on 2012, at 72% for the1st and2nd cycles compared with 82% and 83% respectively in 2012.
With regard to professional training delivered by INA Expert, the fill rate for catalog courses reached 79%. This is in line with the COM target. The Board applauds INA's dynamic approach, with a 20% increase in the number of courses on offer in 2013, particularly in the digital field. The institute succeeded in maintaining its sales (€8.534 million, down 2%) with 28% new customers, despite a drop of more than 30% in the number of major accounts.
IV. - Company management
The public contribution received by INA totaled 89.89 M€ (down 1% on 2012). This is less than forecast in the contract of objectives and means for 2013: 92.80 M€ (excluding real estate). Public resources account for 69% of the Institute's total revenues. The business plan appended to the COM 2010-2014 made provision for an average annual increase in resources of 2% over the five years of the COM. The company has had to cope with a reduction in its budget, mainly due to the Institut National de l'Audiovisuel's contribution to the recovery of public finances.
In 2013, INA's sales (own revenues) fell by 3%. It totaled €39.756 million. At the same time, operating expenses fell by 2% to 110.786 M€. As a statement of case, the 2012 financial year included insurance expenses linked to the revaluation of the estimated risk of retirement indemnity, following the signing of the collective agreement. Nonetheless, for the sixteenth year running, the company's net income was positive.
The company's own resources declined across all divisions. Three divisions account for 96% of own revenues. These are the Content, Collections and Education & Research divisions.
In the Content division, the sharp drop in Extracts sales compared with 2012 is the result of lower activity in the entertainment segment (-25% on "variety" disposals). According to INA, the new per-second pricing structure introduced in 2013 accounts for 30% of the drop in "extracts" sales. The overhaul of sales schemes for both professionals and the general public should increase the commercial visibility of the Institute's products.
The Collections division mainly comprises FTV-Radio France-TF1 manager contracts, which account for 90% of this division's revenues. This division is dedicated to the collection, enrichment, conservation and communication of our collections. Revenues were down 1% (minus €0.163 million) on 2012. Sales, which account for 29% of contract employee revenues, totaled 11.9 M€.
The Teaching and Research division covers activities relating to knowledge, its transmission and its creation. Sales came to €8.53 million in 2013, a slight drop on 2012 (€8.69 million). Professional training, which accounts for 59% of this division's total sales, fell by 7%. The overhaul of the training catalog and the establishment of the new Issy-les-Moulineaux site focused on training in content strategy, marketing and management should help to revive INA's training business.
With regard to human resources management, the new collective agreement was implemented on January 1, 2013. As part of the drive to improve their acquired experience, the Institute has supported employees in a validation process. The constant annual target is for three individual validation procedures to be initiated, and twelve by the end of COM. Under the provisions of internal communication, this target has not been met.
The summons to control payroll costs has been met. The ratio of personnel costs to resources is 53.5%, against a COM target of 54%. It should be noted, however, that since 2011 the ratio of personnel costs to resources has been rising steadily (51% in 2011, 52% in 2012, 54% in 2013). Moreover, this ratio is calculated in relation to revenues, not operating expenses.
The Institute's workforce comprised 934 full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs, down from 952 in 2012. The reduction in headcount offsets the increase in payroll linked to the signing of the new collective agreement in November 2012, the cost of which amounted to €1.290 million with the revaluation of certain functions and variable elements. To remain within the COM targets for personnel costs, the Institute now has very little room for maneuver. The Board will be particularly vigilant on this point.