National broadcasters RTÉ and Today FM have suffered in the latest radio listenership survey, but local commercial services including Newstalk, 98 FM and FM 104, have been boosted.
The Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR) survey for 2003 will come as a further blow to RTÉ radio which has been losing market share over the last three years, although some of this is partly explained by a 2 per cent fall in national radio listenership.
A number of RTÉ's flagship programmes have suffered serious declines, especially Morning Ireland, Liveline and Today with Pat Kenny. However Today FM, RTÉ's main national rival, also endured setbacks, with prime time broadcasters such as Matt Cooper and Ian Dempsey losing thousands of listeners.
Nationally, 54 per cent of listeners tuned into a regional or local station in 2003, unchanged from 2002. RTÉ Radio One was chosen by 28 per cent, down 2 per cent; 2 FM was selected by 25 per cent, down 2 per cent; Today FM was favourite with 14 per cent, down 3 per cent; while Lyric FM was favoured by 3 per cent of listeners, down 1 per cent.
Dublin continued to produce the most ferocious competition, with RTÉ Radio One achieving a listenership figure of 31 per cent, down 5 per cent. 2 FM was down in this market by 2 per cent, although Lyric managed to hold its position in Dublin.
In Cork, the position was slightly better for RTÉ Radio One which went up 1 per cent, although 2 FM was down again by 5 per cent.
In terms of individual programmes, most of RTÉ's flagship shows lost listeners, mainly due to the onslaught of local rivals, particularly in Dublin.
In the crucial morning prime time slot, Morning Ireland remained the most listened to radio show in the Republic. However, its dominance declined during 2003, with 34,000 listeners tuning out.
Marian Finucane, who some observers believe may be moved elsewhere in RTÉ's schedule, lost 7,000 listeners, although this was less than some had predicted.
2 FM's Gerry Ryan had the third most listened to show in the Republic with 360,000 listeners, although this was down 24,000 from 2002.
Today With Pat Kenny also suffered a fall from 352,000 listeners to 332,000 in 2003. Liveline with Joe Duffy was down from 365,000 to 341,000.
One of the few RTÉ programmes which increased its figures was Five Seven Live, presented by Rachel English, which grew audience from 212,000 in 2002 to 218,000. RTÉ said this was "of particular significance".
RTÉ's managing director of radio, Mr Adrian Moynes, said: "This is a robust set of figures for RTÉ Radio. All of our peak-time programmes lead in their categories, and the 10 most popular programmes are RTÉ productions, six from RTÉ Radio 1 and four from RTÉ 2 FM."
Among the commercial stations Newstalk was one of the biggest gainers in Dublin with its listenership rising to 4 per cent from 3per cent in the last survey. The most gratifying thing for the station, said managing director Mr Dan Healy, was that in the last six months listenership was up to 5 per cent.
98 FM and FM 104 also expressed delight with their improving figures.
Elsewhere in the country, there were big listenership gains for East Coast radio in Wicklow, CKR FM based in Carlow and Limerick's Live 95 FM.
The big losers in local radio listenership were Radio Kerry (down 11 per cent) and Highland Radio (down 7 per cent).