The South Today covers news from the regions across the South Island. The South Today team covers local people, local issues and puts a local spin on national news.

Parochial and proud of it, the programme is the only half-hour, live, local television news in the country, and as such, is the anchor of Channel 39.

The news goes out live at 5.30pm, prior to the network news, and is repeated at 7pm and 9:30pm to offer a choice for viewers.

The South Today stays differentiated from other southern media in that it concentrates on television journalism and focuses on The regions around the south island, the people and events in those areas. The programme tells its stories in pictures, which gives it another focus when compared to other local media outfits.

“We put local people on air.” That means more positive stories about people rather than politics. “People who are on the news are often surprised at how many people watch it . . . by the number of people who come up to them in the days afterwards to say they have seen them.”

This year the team plans the same level of service to the south island communities – quality stories covering local and national events and many more local people seeing themselves on television.

Local people tune to local news weeknights:

• Monday to Friday 5.30pm (live)
• Monday to Friday 7.00pm (repeat)
• Monday to Friday 9.30pm (repeat)

In addition to terrestrial broadcast, this programme is also available as a webcast at 8pm each weeknight.

This programme is made with the assistance of New Zealand On Air.