Australian documentary makers are struggling to make a living and are losing the
grip of their rights to their own intellectual property, Kingston Anderson, general
manager of Australian Directors Guild told the Australian International
Documentary Conference in Adelaide yesterday.
The comments came after Ruth Harley, Screen Australia CEO on Tuesday told the
conference as a keynote speaker, the value of documentary production was the
highest on record to date and driven by more hours of high production value series.
In Tuesday’s address, Harley said: “It’s been a great year for documentaries with 430
hours of Australian documentary projects made in 2010/11 and a total of $133
million spent on documentary production. This is above the $118 million five-year
average for documentary production.”
Anderson’s point was backed by an ADG survey which showed that the income levels
of documentary makers have declined further in the last 12 months, from 55.5% of
2011 respondents earning less than $45,000 compared to 58.6% of respondents in
2010 earning less than $60,000 per annum. This is below the average Australian
wage for August 2011 of $68,700.