Challenges the new norm

It has become the norm to report the challenges of trading in the academic sector. In an economy that is in recession, confidence is low. Academic members have been facing stronger competition from traditional academic players and newer entrants.

Strikes, protests and administrative challenges at institutions have not helped but have been much less than in previous years. Student funding has been growing however spend on books has not been proportional to the increases in funding.

Members have turned to innovation and creative marketing campaigns in response. These bold steps must be applauded. They keep our sector and industry working hard. The major beneficiaries are students as our primary consumers and that is good for our industry.

The last 12 months were fraught with publisher service delivery issues. The beginning of 2017 suffered from stock shortages, billing issues and poor delivery. These impacted on sales and availability at peak buying period.

Photocopies, counterfeits and the distribution of digital copies on campus or via social media have been repeatedly noted. Counterfeiting has been noted as a global problem as Cengage, McGraw-Hill and Pearson have charged Follet (a major textbook distributor in the US) with such copyright infringement.

Booksellers have had little or no feedback from the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). There have been efforts to fight fraud and phishing of students to access their funds. The expected increase in number of institutions on the SBux system did not materialise and the shift to students buying low margin devices over books is of concern.

Academic booksellers held a very successful workshop in October 2016 and invited all Publishers to participate. This was well attended and sponsored by a few publishers. Apart from a fabulous lunch, the discussions were positive and in depth. Participants were pleased that the engagements were open and honest. As the first event of its kind we are hoping to repeat this in October/November 2017.

Feedback on the Workshop
“It was a good experience for us, and an opportunity to see the challenges currently faced by the book sellers.” Craig Bruckmann, McGraw-Hill Education.

“We found the session really insightful…” Aamina Gangat Head of Sales: Pearson Higher Education.

“It was a pleasure being part of this meeting and hopefully there will be another coming up in the New Year” Teresa Fuchs, Sales Manager: South Africa, Cengage Learning.

“Thanks for creating a platform for us to discuss and collectively find resolutions to both the internal and external issues facing our businesses. This event also afforded us the opportunity to connect with colleagues in the industry…” Botho Mothibi, Oxford University Press.

The shift to online is growing with very strong price pressures, especially where margins are minimal. While this may be great for the consumer, perceptions of value are also being skewed.

The volatility of our currency is of concern as a large number of titles are imported.

The Copyright Amendment Bill is a worrying for the academic sector. This could have severe implications for the long-term viability of and motivation for producing academic content in SA. Short-term gains in education costs could easily be lost as the incentive to produce quality textbooks is taken away by the proposed legislation’s loose restrictions on “fair” or “educational” use.

We did not host the usual number of teleconferences in 2017 and hope to improve on this in the year to come.

ACADEMIC SECTOR REPORT
Mohamed Kharwa
SABA Academic Chairperson
August 2017