BBC’s Jackie Edwards to Head U.K.’s Young Audiences Content Fund

Jackie Edwards has been appointed as head of the Young Audiences Content Fund (YACF), a new initiative being delivered by the BFI.

Edwards has been the BBC’s head of children’s acquisitions and independent animation since 2015. She will join the BFI in February.

YACF is part of the British government’s support for “distinct, high-quality content” for children and young audiences to be broadcast on U.K. public service broadcasters. The YACF aims to bolster the creation of content for children and young audiences (up to the age of 18) that “entertains, informs and reflects their experiences of growing up across the U.K. today.” It will support original programming, both live action and animation, and across genres such as education, fiction and drama, arts and culture, factual and religion. The fund will offer production funding for projects that have secured a broadcast commitment from a U.K. pubcaster to make the program available to a U.K. audience on a free-to-access, Ofcom-regulated service.

The fund opens for applications in April. YACF is part of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport’s Contestable Fund and assigns the BFI up to £57 million to deliver a three-year pilot.