[2022 National Audit] Publishing Industry Facing Sales Decline... 95% Say "Never Received Support"

[Asia Economy Reporter Seo Mideum] While overall sales in the publishing industry are showing a downward trend, it has been confirmed that support for publishing activities has been reduced.

According to an analysis of the 2021 Publishing Industry Survey by the Korea Publication Industry Promotion Agency conducted by Im O-kyung, a member of the National Assembly's Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee from the Democratic Party of Korea, the sales revenue of publishing businesses in 2020 was 3.8728 trillion KRW, a 2.6% decrease compared to the previous year. This figure significantly exceeds the average annual decline rate of 0.8% since 2015.

The number of employees in publishing businesses also decreased from 28,483 in 2015 to 26,622 in 2020, declining at an average annual rate of 1.3%.

Despite this downturn, only 5.2% responded that they had experience receiving support for publishing activities. Nearly 95% reported no support, a sharp drop in 2020 compared to steadily increasing rates since the statistics began: 20.6% in 2017, 27.2% in 2018, and 31% in 2019.

In particular, except for large publishers with sales exceeding 10 billion KRW, the lower the sales, the lower the support rate, indicating difficulties in the survival of small-scale publishers.

Assembly member Im O-kyung stated, “Although new literary content such as web novels is driving the Korean Wave, the publishing industry as a whole has been in a nearly decade-long slump,” and added, “The government must actively consider measures to support the publishing sector, including author development and content discovery.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.