Some Statistics on Bookstores and Publishing in China
I have been able to meet several different Christian workers in Beijing since being here. One of the guys that I recent met with is involved in legally publishing Christian books in China. It was encouraging to be able to speak with him and I thought I would share some statistics about the subject from their website. I am sure many of these will surprise you!
Some Statistics on Bookstores and Publishing in China
- There are 167,000 bookstores in China of which 43,000 are state owned. The balance are private – about 120,000 bookstores.
- There are 300 online bookstores.
- In 2003 there were about 15 private Christian bookstores in China. Today there are approximately 150 with a new store opening every month.
- Of the 577 publishing houses that have the authority to issue ISBN numbers (a licence given by the central govt): 37 are alligned with various Beijing government administrations; 9 are publishing groups; 101 are university presses; 413 are provincial which are often not known or distributed outside of their province. They represent 60% of the market share of all book publishers in China.
- There are 10,000+ private book companies that are “allowed” to edit, design, print, market, etc. They do not have the authority to issue ISBN numbers and so they must go through one of the publishing houses.
- There are approximately 6 to 8 private Christian publishing companies. Many house church members (even in Beijing) are still unaware that it is possible to legally buy a Christian book.
- In 2002, more than 60,000 titles were published in China, only 36 of them were Christian. In 2002, one Christian bookstore in Shanghai stocked more than 60 titles. Today, they sell about 600.
- China’s literacy rate is 93%.
- 50% to 60% of publishing revenues are text book related. Scale and profits are declining due to “free content” and “sharing.”
- There are 50,000 libraries which are primarily located in colleges and schools. There are only 2,000 public libraries. Consequently, in many locations the private bookstores have become the local libraries with the aisles filled with people reading books.
- The top publisher is Higher Education Press (or possibly China Machine Press) with 2.56% market share. Higher Education Press (HEP) releases 2,000+ new titles every year. They annually sell over 121 million units and have $343 million in annual revenues. A woman representing HEP said that book publishing in China is a “fast changing world” including “digital” and “customized” publishing. She added that to succeed HEP is pursuing “innovation, globalization, and partnerships.”
- The top 10 publishers have 25% market share. Compare this to the top 10 trade book publishers in the USA which have 71% market share. It is clear that book publishing is still developing and not concentrated, representing great opportunities.
- Currently, the total number of Christian books in legal circulation is about 600. Reformed books are a very small fraction of that amount.
Source: Robert Morrison Project
Infanticide & Abortions in China
“Worldwide abortion is rather prevalent and is quite frequently seen as an appropriate method of birth control. In Red China—approximately one out of every four persons in the world today lives in China—the government felt that population control was a necessity. As a result, in 1979 it introduced a policy that no family is allowed to have more than one child. This policy has led to infanticide (usually of female babies) and massive numbers of abortions. Abortions can range as high as 800,000 a year in a single province of China. Those who refuse face significant pressures to comply one way or another, as the government can impose severe financial penalties for failure to comply.”
Feinberg, J. S., Feinberg, P. D., & Huxley, A. (1996). Ethics for a Brave new world (47–48). Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books.
| Posted in China Stats, Chinese Culture, Chinese History, Quotes | 6 Comments »
China’s Gender Imbalance
The one child policy in China has had many bad repercussions. Here is a clipping from on article about the problem of gender imbalance in China. It is heart-breaking to read the stats and know this is taking place. Pray for these families and young women to be reached with the Gospel so their lives can be changed eternally!
The Problem of Gender Imbalance in China
…”In China, however, the proportion of males at birth is about 1.2/1. And it is even higher in the group of elder children (1-4 years old). Recent survey (2005) showed that in the group of Chinese under 20 years old there are 32 millions more males than females!
It’s not the secret that many Chinese feel very unhappy if their only child is a girl. Thus, the question is — what possibilities are available to parents who want to control the gender of their baby? The survey mentioned above names them:
- determining the gender of fetus during pregnancy and aborting in case it is female
- killing the newborn girls
- transferring baby girls for adoption
- giving half-hearted treatment for sick daughters in cases of illness
Due to availability of ultrasound, since the mid-1980s the main contributor to abnormal gender ratio became thesex-selective abortion (instead of post-birth neglect and abandonment of girls). And though the pre-birth sex determination has been outlawed in China, it is hard to explain the sex ratio distortion of such scale without assuming that “son-desperate” couples have access to illegal medical services.
Of course, majority of families never use any of the options mentioned above. But too often Chinese girls feel that their parents would be happier if they were boys. This cultural phenomenon is not restricted to mainland China. Let me quote one story about American Chinese from an interesting blog “At the back of the hill”:
Bright, vivacious, super intelligent. Her mom frequently verbally abused her in public, and the entire family got on her case for being admitted to Berkeley — stupid girl, so much money! So she never went. Did City College for three years, committed suicide in the fourth.
Her brother went to Stanford, and had his own apartment in Palo Alto. His education was funded entirely by his grandfather, because the boy would make the family proud.
Last I heard, they were very proud of him. He’s a PHD.
It is forbidden to ever mention that bad luck girl. Who?I guess that at this point you won’t be surprised to learn the fact that China is the ONLY country in the world where more women commit suicide than men. Actually, 56 percent of the world’s female suicides occur in China!”…
10.8.10
100 Second Traffic Light
Our main mode of transportation currently are taxis. Usually, we walk from our fifth floor apartment to the road and wait for a taxi at the street. Then after several minutes usually we get a taxi and head to our destination. The first light we come to is at the corner of our road. It is a 100 second light! There is a big timer by the traffic light that has a countdown that starts as soon as the light turns. I couldn’t help but think of the death rate counters that represent souls going off into eternity. I did the math and during the time that we sit at the light and simply wait for it to turn green so we can go on our way, 29 people in China pass into eternity. Using the highest percentage of Christianity in China that is reported would mean that only 2 of those would claim to be Christian and 27 would perish in Hell for all eternity. Every 100 seconds, 29 people die in China, most go to hell, many have never heard. Lord, here am I…use me!
More death rate stats for China.
08.21.10
Official Survey Reports 23 Million Christians in China
HONG KONG – Christians in China now number just over 23 million, according to the results of the Communist country’s first official faith survey.
Although that figure amounts to only 1.8 percent of the total population, it represents 73 percent of China’s religious population.
The figures were contained in the newly published Blue Book on China Religions, compiled by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, an academic unit under the control of the Chinese government, according to China Daily.
The academy looked at the responses of over 60,000 questionnaires carried out in more than 300 counties across China.
Among the Christians interviewed, 69 percent of them said that they had converted to Christianity because they or their family members had fallen ill. A staggering 70 percent of those describing themselves as Christian were female and 67 percent of all Christians surveyed said they had been baptized.
The academy attributed the growth to societal reform over the last three decades, with 73 percent of Chinese Christians having joined the church after 1993, and only 18 percent having joined the church between 1982 and 1992.
“These statistics clearly indicate that the 30-year period of reform and opening up has been a period of rapid development for both Chinese society and the Chinese church,” Fu Xianwei, who heads the body that ensures churches follow state interests, was quoted as saying by China Daily.
Researchers noted a change in church demographics, with more young people, intellectuals and professionals joining the church in recent years.
To cope with the increase in number, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of churches in China, which now number more than 55,000.
Researchers noted that although the church had grown, Christian communities are still marginalized in society.
The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said on its website that Christianity mainly attracts people with low social status, including the poor, the women and older people.
It said that while half of Christians had completed their primary education, only 2.6 percent of them attained a college degree or higher.
There are different estimates on the total number of Christians in China when attendance at unregistered churches is taken into account, with figures ranging from 40 million to 130 million.
The Blue Book also touched on figures for Catholicism, Buddhism, Islam and Taoism. The number of Catholics in China, according to the book, is 5.7 million.
06.26.10
China Stats: Size of the Task
“It will not do to say that you have no special call to go to China. With these facts before you and with the command of the Lord Jesus to go and preach the gospel to every creature, you need rather to ascertain whether you have a special call to stay at home.” - J. Hudson Taylor
China Stats:
- There are 31,557,600 seconds in a year. That means that to spend one second with everyone in China, you would need just less than 42 years because there are 1,325,419,200 seconds in 42 years. That is if we could stop the population exactly where it is now with no deaths or births for the next 42 years. Now take that same statistic and give yourself one hour with each person, and you would need approximately 151,200 years if you could work day and night. That is approximately 2160 lifetimes at 24 hours a day and 7 days a week for 70 years.
- If we stopped the birth and death rate in China, it would take a Pentecost every day for 1,000 years to reach all the people in China for Christ.
- If you were to line up the population of China with one foot between each person, the line would be 272,000 miles long.
- If you placed the population of India and China side by side the line would circle the globe 18 times and the line grows by 20 miles every day. Out of those millions in China and India 99% have never heard of the Lord Jesus Christ. The world knows more about Coca Cola than Jesus Christ and we have the “Real Thing”.
Taken from Hundred Fold Men by Austin Gardner.
China’s Death Rate Per Year!
China’s Death Rate Per Year: 9.13 million people (world rank: 1st) (2008 estimate)
Breakdown:
17.36 people per minute
1,042 people per hour
25,000 people per day
175,001 people per week
760,420 people per month
Comparison: Population of the State of Georgia = 9.829 million people (2009)
05.14.10
China Poverty Statistics
- “Poverty in China refers to people whose income is less than a poverty line of $1.25 per day.”
- “Poverty has affected all aspects of China, including the environment, health, education, housing, nutrition, and agriculture. It has disrupted families and communities, and sent millions from the poorer regions to the cities in a desperate search for work.”
- “61 million or 4.6% of Chinese are considered below the national poverty line.”
- “According to the World Bank, 219 million or 16.6% of Chinese still live on less than $1 per day. This is extreme poverty and it means families are not able to afford the most basic necessities to ensure survival.”
- “620 million or 47% of Chinese live on less than $2 a day. At this income level, it is not possible to have many of the things we take for granted, such as healthcare and education. The smallest misfortune (health issue, job loss, etc) threatens survival.”
- “Poverty is an almost exclusively rural phenomenon, with 99% of China’s poor hailing from rural China”
- “Levels of poverty are higher and more severe in China’s western regions, but nearly half of the poor are in other parts of the country.”
Islam in China
Here are a few quick highlights about Islam in China taken from “A report on the size and distribution of the World’s Muslim Population. I copied and pasted the interesting parts about China below:
- Estimated 2009 Muslim Population: 21,667,000 (Afghanistan has 28,072,000)
- Percentage of Population that is Muslim: 1.6%
- Percentage of World Muslim Population: 1.4%
- “China has more Muslims than Syria”
- “Of the 232 countries and territories included in this study, 50 are Muslim-majority. Out of these, however, more than six-in-ten (62%) have a smaller Muslim population than do Russia and China individually.”
- “There are Muslims in every province of China, but the highest concentrations are in the west, primarily in Xinjiang, Ningxia and Gansu, with other significant populations in Henan, Qinghai,Yunnan, Hebei and Shandong. Xinjiang is the only Muslim-majority province of China, with Muslims accounting for approximately 53% of the total population.”
“Mapping the Global Muslim Population” by Pew Research Center. October 2009. See Pages 1,7,8,&13. - Download the full report
11.6.09
Mongour of China – Evangelical: 0.00%! – 47,000 Souls
“The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few; Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.” Will you pray for this people group in China of 47,000 souls that have no gospel witness. Will you give your life to take the Gospel to this people? Will you give them a chance to know the love of God given through Jesus Christ? Will will surrender? Who will go? Read of this people group below, then pray and ask God to send forth labourers. Finally, ask God, “does that mean me, do you want me to go?” (Yes or No)
Identity
Although the Mongour have been officially included as part of the Tu nationality, they speak a very different language and possess a separate identity from the Tu in other locations. As one researcher explains, “The Tu call themselves Mongol, except those living in Minhe, who form a minority, where the word is pronounced Mongour. This term has mistakenly been used by some Western scholars as the general name for all Tu.”
History
When the ancestors of today’s Tu and Mongour people first came to Qinghai, the area was occupied by Tibetans, Uygurs, and a group called the Shato. By the late 1300s, the Tu had divided into 16 clans. Eight clans were called Tu (White Mongol), five Shato, one Black Mongol, one Turkish (Uygur), and one Chinese.Customs
The Mongour have several unique marriage customs. One is called “marriage to the pole” by which a girl stays with her family and takes in lovers. Any children born to her take her family’s name. Another is the “marriage to the girdle” where a Mongour girl sleeps with a guest, who upon departure leaves his girdle behind. In case the girl becomes pregnant, she would be “married to the girdle.” During child delivery, the mother and baby stay confined to a room for one month. Men are barred from entry; only the closest female relatives are allowed to enter.Religion
Two types of shamans are active among the Mongour. “White shamans” are used to heal sickness, while “black shamans” bring vengeance on enemies. Another highly regarded religious figure is the kurtain. This is a person who allows himself to be possessed by an evil Daoist spirit.Christianity
By the 1920s Catholic missionaries were active in the Mongour region, but no church remains today. Although most Mongour can read, there are no Scriptures available in their language. Missionary Frank Laubach issued a warning to the Church in the 1930s: “Millions in China will soon be reading. Are we going to give them reading matter? Will they be flooded with the message of Christ or with atheism? Will they read love or hate? This is the most stupendous, most arresting, most ominous fact, perhaps on this planet.”Text source: Copyright © Operation China, Paul Hattaway. Used with permission.
