A report, recently published by the King Abdul-Aziz Al Saud Foundation for Islamic Studies and Human Sciences in Casablanca, reveals that the Arabic language is the most widely used in the publishing sector in the Kingdom, particularly in the fields of literature and humanities and social sciences.
In this document on the state of publishing and books in Morocco in 2022, the Foundation indicates that the results of Moroccan publishing for the year 2022 amount to 1,320 titles, 90% of which are in paper and 10% in digital, says the report, explaining that the distribution by languages reveals that the Arabic language is the most used in the publishing sector, especially in the fields of knowledge covered by the report.
The balance sheet of Moroccan paper and digital publications during the year 2022 shows that the use of the Arabic language in the fields of literary and intellectual production is still on the rise, exceeding 79%, the report further notes.
He also points out that the rate of publication in French, on the other hand, has continued to decline, “because this language represents only 17.42% of the total of Moroccan publications during the same year, whereas English and Spanish languages are still at their lowest with rates of 2.58 and 0.38 respectively”.
With regard to the distribution of publications (paper and digital) by fields of knowledge, the report indicates that Moroccan literary creativity (novel, short story, poetry, theatrical text, etc.) takes the lion’s share in terms of publishing in Morocco with a percentage of 18.71% of the total books published in 2022 (247 titles), followed by legal studies (242 titles, or 18.33%), History (152 titles, or 11.52%) , then Islamic studies (127 titles) and studies related to social issues (118 titles).
In addition, the results of publications by Moroccan authors abroad in 2022 reached 282 books, including 90 published in France and 81 in the countries of the Near East as well as 50 titles published in the Gulf region, while the share from the Maghreb region (notably Tunisia) was 14 titles.
It should be noted that the King Abdul-Aziz Al Saud Foundation for Islamic Studies and Human Sciences in Casablanca publishes each year, at the time of the International Publishing and Book Fair (SIEL), a report on the state of Moroccan publishing in the fields of literature and human and social sciences.
The report includes detailed bibliographic information on Moroccan publications, paper and digital, in the fields of literature and the humanities and social sciences, broken down according to several criteria, including languages, fields of knowledge, translations and printing at across the national territory, in addition to the publications of Moroccan authors abroad (books in particular), with the aim of making known the Moroccan intellectual production in the Arab and foreign cultural scene.