Publishers and educators are disputing a study released by the Ministry of Culture earlier this week which concluded that on average Taiwanese read 13.5 books per year.
Critics questioned the figure, saying it is an overly optimistic number and queried how the study was carried out.
The latest study follows a government study released last year which cited a figure of 2 books per year, and summarized a decline in reading habits and the erosion of literacy.
On Tuesday, during a seminar with publishers and educators, Minister of Culture Lung Ying-tai (龍應台) said “the previous study was based on information from the now-defunct Government Information Office. We went back to dig up the material, but found its basis was lacking and therefore was unreliable. So we decided to commission a new study.”
The latest study shows that 70 percent of the books on the best-sellers list are translations of foreign books, while only 30 percent were books by Taiwanese authors.
Linden Lin (林載爵) of Linking Publishing Co said the 13.5 figure surpasses what is known by industry insiders.
“Were textbooks included in the study? Was buying a book counted as reading a book? Or was the reading figure related to borrowing books [from libraries]?” Lin asked.
According to an official from United Marketing Research Co, which was responsible for the study, when a person flips through a few pages while perusing a book it would count as “having read a book.”
The official’s reply was greeted with an uproar at the seminar, with attendees saying the ministry’s study had no worth.
Taiwan Digital Publishing Forum secretary-general Chang Jung-kuei (張榮貴) said such a study should be more precise.
“We are in digital book publishing, so we know each week that there are more than 100,000 digital book downloads, but actual reading of these is not at the level we would like,” Chang said. “If the ministry’s 13.5 figure is correct, then there should be 240 million books sold in Taiwan each year, but that is obviously not the case.”
“I am certain the 13.5 figure is wrong. It is far removed from the real market situation. Studies into reading habits should be carried out in the long term by one [government] agency,” Cite Publishing Group chief executive Ho Fei-peng (何飛鵬) said.
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