According to the Ministry of State, press funding is calculated proportionally based on the number of pages produced in a year and has the purpose of supporting the diversity of the Luxembourgish press.
The Tageblatt and Luxemburger Wort received the highest amount of funding in 2018, as both papers had the highest number of pages produced in the year. Both received around €1.4 million each.
Conversely, the multilingual weekly paper Woxx received the smallest amount of funding at €270,000.
As detailed by the ministry, press sources must fill a number of conditions before requesting financial aid. First of all, the newspaper in question must employ at least journalists with permanent contracts and its main language must be Luxembourgish, French, or German.
In 2018, ten media sources fulfilled these conditions and correspondingly received financial aid from the state.
The print media receives further indirect support through significantly reduced tariffs offered by POST Luxembourg to send and distribute the papers. Papers also receive funding in publishing official notices.
Online media sources have been able to apply for state funding as of two years ago. The team requirements are much lower, corresponding to lower amounts of funding.
Online media sources only require teams of at least two journalists in order to be eligible for funding.
Each year, the state pays out a maximum of €100,000 per online media source. In 2018, 13 pages were able to profit from the funding. The state paid around €1 million in funding last year.
Audiovisual media does not fall under the umbrella of press funding according to the legislation. In that sense, RTL does not receive any financial support from the state, but does have a concession agreement in place.
The agreement details that the parent company produces television programmes in Luxembourgish and in return does not have to pay the state for the use of radio and television frequencies.
Radio 100,7 is completely funded by the state as a public broadcaster and receives around €6 million per year to cover costs.
