Māori Television was privileged to host the inaugural World Television Broadcasting Conference in Auckland, Aotearoa-New Zealand, in March 2008.  The aim was to facilitate the opportunity for indigenous television broadcasters to come together for the first time ever at an international level. This was made much easier by the interest and support which indigenous broadcasters showed in the months leading up to and including the event.

The theme of WITBC ’08 was 'reclaiming our future’ which related specifically to our obligations and responsibilities as indigenous broadcasters to safeguard and develop our unique indigenous languages and cultures. Accordingly, the vision for the conference was that it would become a permanent, international event that would unify, strengthen and promote indigenous broadcasters throughout the world.

We believe that vision has been effectively shared with all attendees at the conference and we are now united in our commitment to meet at least every two years to review our collective progress and plan for the challenges ahead.