Competition among publishers sought through textbook review

Under Secretary for Education Kenneth Chen says the Government will improve the inspection of textbooks to lower the threshold for new textbook publishers. Introducing competition in the textbook industry will provide better quality and more reasonably priced teaching materials to schools.

Chen said the threshold for new publishers is high at the moment. For example, textbook publishers need to have a large sales team, and they also need to provide a large amount of free teaching materials to schools to promotes sales.
 
He revealed that feedback from teachers reveals that some of these materials were not being used, with a large amount of these stocks being thrown away. There is a demand for publishers to separately price materials teachers need most, such as books, question banks and CDs.
 
The Education Bureau announced in May that if publishers fail to to separately price materials teachers need most within a year, the Government will invite tenders for publishing textbooks and learning materials.