TV channels Martinique

Martinique's television is that of an island between France and the Caribbean: a field where the French public service meets a dense cluster of local channels serving the island and its diaspora.

How television came to Martinique

Television reached Martinique in 1964, when the French public broadcaster opened a station near Fort-de-France, inaugurated on 12 July that year. The channel made an early mark in 1972 with the island's first live satellite relay - the Munich Olympic Games - and passed through the successive identities of French broadcasting, taking colour in 1978 along the way: FR3-Martinique in 1975, RFO Martinique in 1982, Télé Martinique in 1999 and, since the digital terrestrial launch of 2010, the France Télévisions service now called Martinique La Première. The analogue transmitters fell silent in November 2011.

The private era

The opening of the airwaves was organised from Paris: in 1990 the CSA called for private local channels, and Antilles Télévision - ATV - went on air on 11 February 1993 as the island's first private station, mixing programmes bought from TF1 and M6 with its own Creole news flashes. A generation later, ATV remains the public channel's principal rival, and a newer layer of local stations has grown around the two.

The local and the general

Zitata TV is the general channel of the island's newer generation: launched in May 2021, taking the place of Zouk TV on the local digital dial, it follows the island's daily life from Fort-de-France to the communes of the north and the south with documentaries, magazines, concerts and talk shows.

The music channels

Martinique is one of the birthplaces of zouk, and its screens show it: Tele Zoukla carries the genre the island is famous for, Identite Tele Caraibes - the television face of Identité Radio - dives into Caribbean culture and entertainment, and FUSION TV, the television offspring of the island's long-running Radio Fusion, keeps a resolutely local tone. TV Famille serves the island's family and faith programming.

From the carnival of Fort-de-France to the diaspora in Paris and Montreal, Martinique's channels carry an island voice that is at once French and Caribbean - with the Carnival and the Tour de la Martinique des yoles rondes among the occasions that bring the whole island to the screen.