The opening song to “Emil of Lönneberga”, “Pippi Longstocking’s” philosophy of life or the beautiful “Moomin trolls” – these are just some of the favourite childhood memories shared by many Nordic viewers who grew up with, and related directly to, such classics in Nordic fiction.
A children’s universe which in many ways reflects a particular Nordic approach to depicting the lives of children, centred on the young characters’ own perspective.
Nordic public service media take children seriously
Nordic children’s content has a tradition of taking children seriously, dealing with matters that are important to children and their development, inspiring them to play and giving them knowledge and insight.
As the global tech giants continue to gain ground in the battle for children’s attention, it is more important than ever that the Nordic public service media companies maintain this traditions but also to develop new relevant childrens content. DR, NRK, RUV, SVT and Yle plays a special role in ensuring that Nordic quality fiction will also be available to children in years to come.
Quality content through joint forces
This is the reason behind a major new collaboration between the Nordic public service broadcasters, who are joining forces to secure a wide offering of quality content across the Nordic region.
As a result, young viewers in the Nordic region will have access to several new Nordic children’s fiction series every year. The series will be available on Nordic childrens channels as well as the DR, NRK, SVT and Yle´s streaming service, either subtitled or dubbed.
More specifically, children living in the Nordic region will have access to at least 14 new children’s fiction series each year, sourced from across the Nordic region in a joint project known as ‘Barn14’ (Childrens14). To this effect, NRK (Norway), YLE (Finland), SVT (Sweden) and DR (Denmark) have committed to co-produce these series as well as making them available in all four countries.
DR, NRK and SVT will each contribute four series per year, and Yle – where Swedish Yle is the main partner – participates with one to two series per year.
“These series, which represent the quality of public service, are constantly being produced throughout the Nordic region and now we want a broader visibility also in neighboring countries,” says Christoffer Forssell, head of program purchasing and collaborations at Svenska Yle.
New talent and innovative content
The “Barn14” collaboration, provides the opportunity to invest in new creative talents and contribute to the creation of children’s fiction that is innovative, it is stated from SVT’s side.
“This collaboration will offer a lot of good drama from all over the Nordic region. Series that can reflect the everyday lives of children and young people in each country and that can show that we actually have a lot in common. We have previously seen that Nordic exchanges have been enormously appreciated by the audience, for example the Norwegian series Skam och remake på Klassen “, says Safa Safiyari, head of SVT Barn.
