UK amateur radio in decline?

Southgate News has a piece about the decline in the numbers of UK radio amateurs, making the point that the rate of deaths is not being made up by new people coming in to the hobby. This is serious stuff. One possibility is introducing a "Beginner's Licence" restricted to VHF/UHF only with commercial gear only. Somehow I doubt this will do the trick as radio is no longer the magic it was to young people in the 1940s-1970s.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2019/october/will-a-beginners-licence-cure-the-slump-in-new-radio-amateurs.htm

Even more simple VHF and up licence?

On Southgate News there is a report about the RSGB's thoughts on activity levels on VHF and UHF bands. Apparently activity levels have dropped badly in the UK and there is talk of an even simpler exam and licence to encourage activity. There is no doubt that the hobby is facing a future crisis as people get older, less active, and die.

Like many things, we seem to try "dumbing down" as the answer. The basic issue is radio is not the magic it was to many in the 1950s and 1960s. These days you only have to look at the magazines for sale in newsagents to see this. Sadly, there are far more gaming, PC and railway magazines with, if you are lucky, just a couple of radio magazines.

Certainly, many on 2m have switched to FT8. A casual tune across the bands would suggest low levels of activity. Some would argue much less wide bands would do.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2018/june/could-a-new-entry-level-licence-boost-vhf-uhf-activity.htm#.Wx42tPZFzIU

UK amateur licences

Southgate News has a report on the number of UK amateur licences according to data released under a Freedom of Information request by OFCOM. The data (not in a clear form) shows the numbers from 2010 to now. I think it shows a peak in 2014 in full licences, but numbers rising for the foundation licences, but I found it not easy to extract. It looks like a dump of data held on a database with no attempt to be very helpful.

See http://southgatearc.org/news/2017/november/uk-ham-radio-license-statistics-released.htm#.Whvd4bp2tMs .

Amateur licences - rising or falling?

This probably depends on which country you are in.  Southgate News picked up a WIA story that reported roughly static numbers in Australia. In the UK, unless a trend is reversed, we are likely to see numbers rapidly fall in the next 20 years. People are getting older and die. Sadly there are too few young people and women in the hobby here in the UK.

Call me sad but every month I look in RadCom to see how many G3s are now SK. It averages about 5 a month. At this rate we'll soon all be dead!

What is it like in your country?

USA amateur numbers up (again)

According to the latest FCC figures, the number of amateur licences in the USA is up again. I think this contrasts with the numbers in many countries where amateur radio is seen as an "old man's" hobby with few youngsters entering and staying in the hobby.  I have said this many times, but we need to understand the dynamics or our hobby will simply die out in the next 20 years. What got us into the hobby is not the same today.

See http://www.govtech.com/em/disaster/Emergency-Communications-Driving-Increase-in-Amateur-Radio-Operators.html