Arabic Print Runs Dwarfed by Demand

Despite the fact that the Arab-speaking world has more than 340 million inhabitants, print runs only average between 2,000 and 3,000 copies for a book published in these markets.

According to Chad W. Post from Open Letter Press, Lebanon and Egypt led the Arabic book market in 2008, with Lebanese publishers releasing 3,330 titles and Egyptian publishers releasing 2,310 titles. With this scarcity of titles, piracy has flourished in sales of textbooks and popular books.

Here’s more from the article, written during the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair: “According to [an expert], the influence of Egyptian and Lebanese publishers can be attributed to the more advanced distribution systems in both countries. There is no ‘mega-distribution’ system in the Arab world, so getting books across borders and into other countries can be quite difficult. Addressing this is one of the main priorities of the Arab Publishers Association, and could go a long way in cultivating a larger audience for some of these works.”

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