Culture secretary Tessa Jowell said she was going to review digital radio take-up in a foreword to a report published by the Digital Radio Development Bureau.
Jowell said that she would be "considering how long it would be appropriate for sound digital broadcasting services to be provided in analogue form".
DAB digital radios came second only to the MP3 players in the consumer electronics market last year, with a 444% annual sales growth rate. So far in 2004, 600,000 digital radios were sold. Cheaper sets, priced at around £50, are also going to be made available to supermarkets to boost take-up of digital radio.
However, only about half, or 385, of the total number of radio stations broadcasting in the UK are currently available on a digital signal.
At a joint Radio Advertising Bureau and BBC seminar last week, research revealed that radio listening is to increase by 10% over the next five years.
The RAB believes that technology enhancements and increased choice, such as listening via internet, mobile phone or via digital television, will lead to an increase in the number of listeners.
The BBC recently emphasised the role it wants to play in digital Britain in the run-up to the TV switchover in 2010.
The corporation's new director-general, Mark Thompson, said: "Digital radios with hard drives to record programmes are already on the market, and most scroll information including track listings and news across a screen on the front of the set."
About 2.2m people say they have listened to radio through a mobile phone, with 13m tuning in via the internet, according to the BBC.
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