BBC Studios expands footprint in Africa with CANAL+

15 March 2026

BBC Studios expands footprint in Africa with CANAL+

BBC Studios has announced that premium factual channel BBC Earth will launch in French language for the first time in Africa on CANAL+ in April 2026.

The launch will bring world class natural history programming and premium factual storytelling to a wider African audience, providing 22 French-speaking Sub-Saharan African countries access to the channel.

The new French language feed will bring BBC Studios’ award winning factual catalogue to millions of additional viewers, offering a breathtaking window into the natural world, pioneering scientific documentaries and extraordinary human stories.

At launch, BBC Earth will present a standout line-up of landmark natural history series and powerful documentaries from BBC Studios’ acclaimed factual library. Viewers can expect celebrated productions from BBC Studios Natural History Unit, including Seven Worlds, One Planet, The Green Planet, Frozen Planet II and Blue Planet II, all narrated by Sir David Attenborough.

The channel line-up also features a wide selection of specialist wildlife documentaries such as Natural World: Giraffes – Africa’s Gentle Giants, My Congo, Cheetah Family and Me, and Natural World: Cheetahs Growing Up Fast, offering intimate portraits of remarkable species and the people working to protect them. Global series including Africa, Earth, Universe and The Planets will also be available on the channel, providing perspectives on the natural world.

Adventure and exploration are also central to the channel, with titles such as Where the Wild Men Are, Life Below Zero, Arctic with Bruce Parry and Steve Backshall’s Extreme River Challenge taking viewers into some of the world’s most remote and challenging environments.

The channel’s programming will be dubbed in French and expertly curated scheduling tailored to the interests and viewing habits of Francophone markets.

Pierre Cloete, VP for Africa at BBC Studios, said: “The French language launch of BBC Earth on CANAL+ marks a significant milestone in BBC Studios’ commitment to making exceptional factual content accessible to global audiences in their own language. We are thrilled to expand BBC Earth’s footprint in partnership with CANAL+. African audiences have a deep passion for documentary storytelling and we are proud to bring even more people the very best of BBC Studios’ natural history, science, and factual catalogue.”

Fabrice Faux, Channels & Content Director for French-Speaking Africa said : “CANAL+ is happy and proud to offer its subscribers the high-quality factual entertainment from BBC Earth, which will ideally complement its discovery vertical. Educational programming is also a key component of CANAL+’s offers in Africa, and BBC Earth is a strong addition in this area.”

The channel will be available on Channel 203 within TOUT CANAL+

TRT launches TRT Afrika digital service

4 April 2023

TRT launches TRT Afrika digital service

Turkiye’s public broadcaster TRT has launched a new digital news platform, TRT Afrika, to highlight stories of and from the continent to a global audience in four languages, Swahili, English, Hausa and French on the second day of the 1^st Broadcasting Summit, organised by TRT and African Union of Broadcasting (AUB). More than 50 media professionals from nearly 25 African countries attended the launching ceremony.

Turkiye’s public broadcaster TRT has launched a new digital news platform, TRT Afrika, to present stories from and about the continent to a global audience in four languages, Swahili, English, Hausa and French on the second day of the 1st Broadcasting Summit, organised by TRT and the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB). More than 50 media professionals from nearly 25 African countries attended the opening ceremony.

Aiming to make Turkiye heard with its international broadcasters, TRT has launched TRT Afrika after TRT World, TRT Arabi, TRT Russian, TRT Deutsch, TRT Francais and TRT Balkan, all of which individually and collectively bring diverse voices and perspectives to global audiences.

The launch ceremony of TRT Afrika, hosted by the Director General of TRT, Mehmet Zahid Sobaci on the second day of the 1st Broadcasting Summit, organised by TRT and the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB), was attended by Fahrettin Altun, Director of Communications of the Presidency of the Republic of Turkiye, Ahmet Albayrak, Chairman of the Board of TRT, Daud Aweis Jama, Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism of Somalia, Gregoire Ndjaka, Chief Executive Officer of the African Union of Broadcasting, TRT management, members of the African Union of Broadcasting and representatives of the foreign mission in Istanbul, along with more than 50 media professionals from nearly 25 African countries.

In the opening speech of the launching ceremony, the Director General of TRT Mehmet Zahid Sobaci emphasised that Africa is subjected to one-sided journalism by the Western media and said, “For years, Africa has been discussed according to the political interests of the West, ignoring the fact that the reasons for the current problems lie in colonialism. The true history, colourful culture, natural beauty and significant stories of the continent were not thoroughly told. TRT Afrika became a manifesto of Turkiye’s constructive and friendly approach, unlike Western society.”

Sobaci explains that TRT Afrika was launched with the goal of being the only platform that sees Africa as it is, and continues, “As an indication of this goal, we have set our motto “Africa as it is” Our new digital news platform will provide news to the entire continent in English, French, Hausa and Swahili. I am convinced that TRT Afrika will help improve our relationship, which has already gained remarkable momentum over the past 20 years. We also continue our efforts to launch the TRT Spanish and TRT Farsi digital news platforms.”

Director General Sobaci pointed out that the 1st Broadcasting Summit organised by TRT and the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB) is one of the most concrete examples of the improving dialog between TRT and African media institutions, saying, “An African proverb says: ‘If you want to go fast, go alone; but if you want to go far, go together.’ Today, with the 1st Broadcasting Summit, we express our will to go further together.”

Gregoire Ndjaka, CEO of the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB), also attended a TRT-AUB summit and said at the ceremony that they came together to strengthen Turkish-African relations and TRT Afrika will reflect the facts about the continent as they are: “The coverage of Africa in other parts of the world gives the impression that it is a place of conflict. We would like TRT Afrika to help us end this perception. As African journalists, we would like to thank President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for his contribution to the development of relations with Africa and for his love for Africa. Because if you do not love a continent, you would not be in that continent and not visit it.”

BBC News launches Africa Eye in French across 27 markets

12 November 2021

BBC News launches Africa Eye in French across 27 markets

For the first time BBC Africa Eye will become available in Algeria, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Chad, Comoros, Congo, DR Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Guinea, Equatorial Guinea, The Gambia, Gabon, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Togo and Tunisia.

EDAN is a pan-African TV station which targets women and the youth across the continent. Founded in 2015, the station is available on Canal Plus Afrique, a satellite subscription-based service broadcasting to 27 countries across Africa. The channel features movies, music and documentary programmes targeted to African audiences across Sub Saharan Africa.

BBC Africa Eye is the award-winning investigative strand that has created a network of trained investigative journalists across the continent to deliver high-impact investigations. Launched four years ago the investigative series has become known for holding power to account.

Evelyn Accrombessi, CEO EDAN, says: “EDAN viewers will now be able to watch BBC Africa Eye, a high-quality BBC programme which will be a great addition to our schedule. We are delighted and very satisfied with the discussions with the BBC teams, their availability and their responsiveness in setting up this partnership. We hope that this is the first step of a long collaboration between the BBC and EDAN.”

Anne Marie Nwaobasi , Business Development Manager, Francophone Africa, BBC World Service says: “This partnership reaches new audiences across Francophone Africa giving them access to BBC’s primetime investigative series.

“BBC Africa Eye features original and high-impact BBC investigations from across Africa. Audiences in more locations across Africa can now watch this award-winning programme on EDAN.”

BBC Africa Eye will be aired on the following days:

Tuesday 2130 GMT
Wednesday 0730 GMT
Wednesday 1300 GMT
Wednesday 1630 GMT
Wednesday 2230 GMT
Saturday 1800 GMT
Sunday 1300 GMT

BBC opens expanded Nairobi bureau

6 November 2018

The BBC launched its largest bureau outside the UK in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, on 5 November. Around 300 of the 600 BBC journalists working across Africa are based in the new, state-of-the-art facility.

“Our most important investment will be in training the next generation of African reporters and producers to world-class standards,” Francesca Unsworth, Director of BBC News, said.

The expansion is being funded by $376m (£289m) from the UK government and the production facilities at the bureau include a TV studio and two further live broadcast positions, two radio studios, two radio workspaces and five TV edit suites.

The Nairobi bureau follows the opening of another major hub in Nigeria’s commercial city of Lagos, where three new language services are based, while there has also been an expansion of the French service based in Senegal’s capital, Dakar.

“We are celebrating the African journalists and programme makers here today who will carry the torch of BBC professionalism, accuracy and impartiality into the future,” Rachael Akidi Okwir, Head of East Africa Languages for the BBC World Service said.

Nairobi-based BBC services: Afaan Oromo: Language of Ethiopia’s biggest ethnic group; Amharic: Ethiopia’s official language; Tigrinya: The main working language of Eritrea, along with Arabic. Also spoken in Ethiopia

Lagos-based BBC services: Igbo: An official Nigerian language. Also spoken in Equatorial Guinea; Yoruba: Spoken in south-western Nigeria and some other parts of West Africa, especially Benin and Togo; Pidgin: A creole version of English widely spoken in southern Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea

Photo: Armstong Too/BBC

BBC Pidgin marks start of World Service expansion

21 August 2017

The BBC World Service launched its first new language service in its biggest expansion since the 1940s on 21 August.

A digital Pidgin service for West Africa has launched and will be followed by new online services in Amharic, Afaan Oromo and Tigrinya, aimed at Ethiopia, Eritrea and diaspora audiences around the world. Further services, including Korean, are set to launch from this autumn. This expansion means BBC News will operate in more than 40 languages.

The BBC World Service expansion comes following a funding boost of £289m from the UK Government.

Director-General of the BBC Tony Hall (pictured left) says: “Today marks the start of a new chapter for the BBC.

“The BBC World Service is one of the UK’s most important cultural exports. In a world of anxieties about ‘fake news’, where media freedom is being curtailed rather than expanded, the role of an independent, impartial news provider is more important than ever. The new services we’re launching will reach some of the most under-served audiences in the world.”

World Service Director Francesca Unsworth (right) says: “For more than 80 years the BBC World Service has brought trusted news to people across the globe. I’m delighted that millions in West and then East Africa will be able to access the BBC in the languages they speak.

“The BBC World Service expansion will also bring benefits to audiences in the UK. Having more journalists on the ground will enrich our international reporting, bringing news from areas which are often under-reported.”

Pidgin is spoken by an estimated 75m people in Nigeria alone, with additional speakers in Cameroon, Ghana, and Equatorial Guinea.

The Pidgin service is fully digital featuring six daily editions of BBC Minute – a 60-second audio news update – followed by two daily news video bulletins in November. Two further services for West Africa – Yoruba and Igbo – will launch at the beginning of next year.

The Amharic, Afaan Oromo and Tigrinya services will launch online and on dedicated Facebook pages next month. This will be followed later in the year with shortwave radio services in each language, consisting of a 15-minute news and current affairs programme, followed by a 5-minute Learning English programme, from Monday-Friday.