Book publishing market snapshots: Malaysia

Amir Muhammad, owner ofBuku Fixi explains the impact of government subsidized vouchers on the Malaysian book industry and the dominance of Malay-language romance novels.

For the third year in a row, the Malaysian book industry received a boost in the form of book vouchers given out to university students. The 1Malaysia Book Vouchers are worth RM250 (about $76) which can typically pay for 10 local paperbacks. As they were given out to 1.3 million students and may be used even for non-educational books, the boost to bookshops is noticeable. The voucher is just one of a slew of feel-good subsidy measures from a government which had lost its traditional 2/3 majority in parliament in the last two general elections.