TOKYO -- Broadcaster NHK has recorded its first increase in receiving fee income in three years, NHK announced on Tuesday in reporting on its fiscal 2006 results.

Revenue from receiving fees rose 1.9 percent to Y613.8 billion ($5,073 million), while total number of receiving fee contracts edged up 3,0000 to 36.18 million. Total earnings from all NHK businesses gained 1.4 percent to Y643.2 billion ($5,316 million), while total outlays fell 1.6 percent to Y619.8 billion ($5,122 million).

Cuts in personnel and other costs helped reduce expenditures for the year. Meanwhile, the number of receiving fee non-payers fell 610,000 from the previous year to 2.98 million, or 8.2 percent of all NHK households.

Many of the non-payers were protesting a succession of NHK scandals, most concerning producers pocketing production funds. Last year NHK started taking the worst of the non-payers to court, which has had a sobering effect on the others.

Finally, the number of households subscribing to NHK’s three-channel BS (Broadcast Satellite) service grew by 370,000 to 12.84 million. BS got a big boost from NHK’s broadcasts last year of the 2006 World Cup in Germany.

© Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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