CHANGES IN THE BOOKTRADE AND PUBLISHING IN HUNGARY 1985-1994

In the planned economy model, publishers brought out the titles for wh ich they had been given permission in a pre-determined number of copie s. Vendors were obliged to take over the publishing output and attempt ed to sell it. If they did not succeed, or had a loss, the state compe nsated them. The transformation of the Hungarian publishing industry a nd booktrade to a market economy model means a change-over to exclusiv ely commercial relations, in which all the players in the market need to have their own capital or be credit-worthy. The increase in turnove r, characteristic for the 1980's, stopped in 1988, the reason being th e decrease in the real income of the population. The number of periodi cals published was also reduced. The proportion of political periodica ls has tripled, with a decline in those of a scholarly nature. In book publishing the number of new titles has somewhat increased in the 90s , with print runs showing a downward trend.