The China Press and Publishing Journal reported that part of the 1,956 publishing organizations withdrew from the market because their permits were revoked after failing to pass the inspection and the rest chose to withdraw by themselves due to inefficient management.

The 122,371 organizations included 51 publishing companies, 6,861 companies for wholesale distribution, 115,126 for retailing distribution, 73 chain organizations and seven joint-stock or foreign-funded companies.

After the inspection, the SPPA said the private-funded publishing and distributing companies have developed rapidly in recent years. Take South China's Guangdong Province as an example, the private publication distributing network amounted to 89.5 percent of the total of the province.

For the distribution of average books, the sales revenue of the private companies exceeded 50 percent of the province's total by the end of 2004, according to the SPPA.

Meanwhile, joint-stock companies, readers clubs and chain store clubs also developed rapidly, the SPPA said.

With the popularization of computers, more people prefer to buy books through the Internet, the SPPA said, predicting that online book purchasing will gradually become the new economic growth point in the publication market.
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(Xinhua News Agency February 20, 2006)