80 percent of books are imported to Kazakhstan from Russia

80 percent of books in the Kazakhstan market are made in Russia, Tengrinews.kz reports citing Kazakhstan National Book Chamber. Book experts say that 40 percent of all the books in Kazakhstan are sold in Almaty. The overall book market of Kazakhstan is estimated at $60 million. Head of the Book Chamber Zhanat Seidumanov said that recently the government started giving more attention to publishing. As per Seidumanov, 1.1 billion tenge ($7.5 million) were allocated from the state budget for publishing of socially important literature in 2010. The volume of printed products made 67.6 thousand items. “Compared to 2009 the number of scientific, fiction, university and kids literature increased in 2010. The share of Kazakhstan-produced books in the local market is gradually growing ,” said Saule Amanbayeva from Kazakhstan National Book Chamber.