Political Parties Spend Nearly 45 Million ISK On Meta Ads In Election Run-Up

Political parties, their affiliated organisations and individual candidates for parliament collectively spent approximately 44.8 million ISK on advertisements across Meta’s social media platforms in the 30 days leading up to the election, reports Vísir.

The Independence Party spent the most, at nearly 9 million ISK. Following them were the People’s Party and the Progressive Party, which spent 7.5 million ISK and 7.2 million ISK, respectively. The Social Democratic Alliance ranked fourth with nearly 5.7 million ISK spent, while the Centre Party spent just under 4.6 million ISK.

Lower down the list, the Pirate Party and Left-Green Movement each spent approximately 3.5 million ISK. The Reform Party invested 2.3 million ISK, while the Socialist Party allocated just over 1.2 million ISK. At the bottom, the Democratic Party spent 230,000 ISK, and Responsible Future spent a modest 24,000 ISK.

Seventeen individual candidates advertised under their own names. Among them, Ásmundur Einar Daðason, outgoing Minister of Education and Children, who spent the most at 629,224 ISK. Despite this investment, Ásmundur failed to secure reelection. Jóhann Páll Jóhannsson of the Social Democratic Alliance, who spent 389,255 ISK, was reelected.

Interestingly, Sigríður Á. Andersen of the Center Party spent only 160 ISK — the lowest among individual candidates — she also successfully secured a parliamentary seat.

Data on how much political parties spent on domestic advertisements or other social media platforms is currently unavailable, leaving the proportion of advertising budgets allocated to foreign social media platforms unclear.

Sigríður Dögg Auðunsdóttir, Chair of the Icelandic Journalists’ Union, highlighted this issue in an interview with Vísir, emphasizing the union’s call for political parties to prioritise advertising in domestic media during the election.

“The advertising landscape has changed dramatically compared to the past, when every advertising króna went to Icelandic media. Research and data from Statistics Iceland reveal that nearly half of all advertising spending in Iceland now flows abroad, primarily to social media platforms. It’s challenging to fully address this issue without knowing how much was allocated to domestic media,” Sigríður Dögg stated.

Taxing tech giants

Efforts to impose a digital services tax on tech giants like Meta remain stalled due to Iceland’s international obligations within the OECD. A task force report from the Ministry of Culture and Business Affairs highlighted the need for a unified global approach, though some countries, such as Canada, have already introduced unilateral measures.

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