“Russia dominates - we have a situation of national disaster” - Ukrainian book publisher
The Russian information product in any of its manifestations dominates Ukraine, which has nothing to oppose it except “love for one’s country and patriotism.”
This was discussed by participants in the Ukraine 30 forum taking place in Kyiv, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“2018, purchases for libraries - 121 million hryvnia, 2019 - 87 million hryvnia, 2020 - 48 million hryvnia, and this year - 50 million hryvnia. Compared to 2018, the inflation rate in the industry was almost 45%, that is, this money, 50 million, is another 45% less.
During the same time, the level of book purchases by local budgets fell almost threefold. It is clear that last year and this year were crises, but still, last year was the worst in the industry since 1999, and this year there was a decline of 30%, that is, we have a situation of national disaster in the book industry,” said the general director of the publishing house “Folio” Alexander Krasovitsky.
At the same time, he called the flow of books from Russia the main problem.
“In 2016, a law was passed on licensing the import of books from Russia, but this is only a filter against anti-Ukrainian literature. To date, 35 thousand permits have been issued during this time, and the import of 370 book titles is prohibited,” the publisher worries.
In turn, the First Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine Rostislav Karandeev complained that it is simply impossible to compete in the book market with Russia without colossal investments.
“Translating everything into Ukrainian is expensive, but we understand that we need to invest in this, that this is an element of national security, and this must be followed, but now there is not enough money.
And if “Folio” itself is capable of translating and publishing several books, but they still focus on the market, it is still a commercial organization that then seeks to sell these books and recoup them.
Therefore, there are problems with the translation of technical books, a problem with the translation of expensive books, with expensive copyrights. The economic problem is one of the main ones. And here we move on to the problem of globalization and the fight against it.
Locally, unfortunately, the Russian information product in any form, according to the laws of globalization, dominates Ukraine, crushes it.
And here you can only oppose it - either love for your country, patriotism, or transferring this issue to the plane of national security, again, through patriotism, or through powerful state and economic investment in this area,” Karandeev lamented.
Karandeev did not explain why unclaimed Ukrainian literature will begin to sell better if there is more of it.
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