Prague, Nov 21 (CTK) – Czechs spent around 7.5 billion crowns on books in 2015, which is about 5 percent or 300-400 million crowns more than the year before, according to the data of the Czech Association of Booksellers and Publishers (SCKN), released yesterday.
The book market volume has increased last year after several years of stagnation thanks to lowering VAT on books and the economic growth, the association says.
Since January 2015, VAT on books has dropped to 10 percent from the 15 percent applied in the previous two years.
However, VAT on books in the Czech Republic is still one of the highest compared with other European countries.
The SCKN’s report shows that the share of online books shops selling printed books was decreasing after a rising trend. In 2015, in rose by 1-3 percent to 23-25 percent.
The market with electronic books kept rising in the Czech Republic last year. It amounted to 106 million crowns, including VAT, and made up 1.38 percent of the total turnover of the Czech book market.
Out of the newly published books, 8 percent were also available in an electronic form last year.
The market with audio books was also rising. Last year, it amounted to almost 82 million crowns, compared with 55 million in 2014.
The SCKN says, referring to the Czech national bibliography, that around 16,600 book titles were published in the Czech Republic last year, which is roughly 400 fewer than in 2014.
A total of 2,587 entities published at least one book last year, which is almost the same figure as in the past few years. However, 1408 of them published one book only, so there were more than 1000 book publishers in the country.
The highest number of book titles was published by the Albatros Media group (885), which has been the market leader since 2011.
Large-volume publishers are those with over 100 book titles a year. Their number dropped from 31 to 24 year-on-year. The state and universities own 11 of them. Most university publishers limited their production last year.
When it comes to annual turnover, Euromedia Group is number one with 1.305 billion crowns and the sales of its own books amounting to 546 million in 2015. Albatros Media had a total turnover of 759 million and the sales of its own books of 728 million between July 2015 and June 2016.
($1=25.436 crowns)
