Xiamen spearheads China in digital reading

Xiamen in East China's Fujian province was recently ranked among the top 10 cities in terms of digital reading nationwide.

Official data show that in 2018, roughly 12.17 million people from Xiamen accessed online libraries while the figure for their WeChat platforms recorded 1.72 million visits.

Not only confined to online, the city's reading enthusiasm could also be reflected offline.

Now Xiamen houses 10 public libraries with a combined floorage of 137,300 square meters, accommodating 7.32 million books. Last year, these libraries received 10.13 million visitors, with per capita visiting volume standing at 2.47 times.

The mounting enthusiasm for reading in Xiamen is partly on the back of local authorities' efforts to promote reading among local residents. One such example is a reading-month event launched by local government since 2004.

In the past five years, more than 470 reading-themed activities were held in Xiamen over the reading months, reaching 2.65 million people.

Meanwhile, the city has also constructed a number of mini-libraries at grass-roots level, which have so far covered 60 percent of communities in rural areas.

The booming reading enthusiasm has also been powering local cultural industry growth, with bookstores as prime beneficiaries.

In 2018, seven private brick-and mortar bookstores with floorage of more than 300 square meters opened in the city. One of them, the new branch of the Xiamen municipal library situated in Jimei district even emerged as a hit tourism destination during the National Day holiday last year.

The value of China's digital reading market reached 25.5 billion yuan ($3.8 billion) in 2018, up 19.6 percent year on year, according to an industry report published earlier this year.