The newspaper industry in Asia remains unaffected by the problems of a stagnating market and declining circulation that have been plaguing the newspaper industry in the West. In fact, the industry is expected to grow in the next 5-10 years, according to a just-released report by Ifra, the world's leading association for newspaper and media publishing.
In most Asian countries, advertising accounts for 50 per cent (in India up to 80 per cent) of the total revenues among English newspapers. Future advertising expenditure is expected to rise as much as the GDP grows (GDP is expected to be four times the actual GDP in twenty years' time when more than 250 million people will belong to the middle class), the Ifra report said. The industry will grow for the next 5-10 ten years, TV will start to lose a bit since satellite and digital TV are fragmenting the market.
The targets for strategic investments will concern the production of quality content and quality image (improvement of presentation design, of colors for classified audience). This, the report pointed out, is already happening in India where Mario Garcia has been restyling two newspapers. Another target is the training of staff, as they are not prepared for the changes that are needed.
These findings have been reported in Business Models of Newspaper Publishing Companies, a report published by Germany-based Ifra and is part of the multi-faceted research project Where News: The media futures research initiative which was launched in March this year. The three-year "Where News?" project is being funded with more than a million Euro, signalling how serious the association's more than 3000 member media houses are taking the new initiative.
Manfred Werfel, Ifra Research Director and Deputy CEO, said, "In general we consider the worldwide newspaper market as being currently divided into a stagnating market (in the west) and a fast growing market in Asia. Many on the problems Western publishers deal with are not relevant for India — like shrinking markets and declining circulation. However, probably in 20 years Indian publishers will face the same problems. So, maybe the Ifra project "Where NEWS?" can be seen as a long-term issue for the still growing markets in Asia."
The Ifra report also carries an analysis on the growth and development of the industry in South Asia based on an interview with Thomas Jacob, International Development Director, Associated Newspaper Ltd of UK. According to Jacob, the English newspaper situation in India was in some ways similar to that in the US, with each major city having one predominant newspaper, The Hindu in Chennai, Deccan Herald in Bangalore, Times of India in Mumbai, Hindustan Times in Delhi similar to New York Times from NY or the Chicago Tribune serving the Chicago area.
The competitive landscape, says Jacob, has now drastically changed with major publishers trying to expand to other geographic regions initiating price wars and marketing campaigns to win readers. The competitive intensity, which he terms as quite "mild" until few years ago, also reached a higher level with the launch of DNA and Hindustan Times in the Mumbai market. A booming economy and the opportunity to raise funds from a well-developed financial market have also contributed to the growth of the newspaper industry in India.
Overall, the report pointed out, newspaper circulation is growing in the developing countries not only because the population is expanding quickly but also because more people can read newspapers and can afford to buy them, especially in India and China. Over the last five years circulation growth in Asia has been more than enough to offset the slow decline in circulation which is taking place in the developed countries.
