Reading between the lines

The annual Hong Kong Book Fair draws approximately a million visitors in a normal year. Its most recent edition, held in July, drew around 850,000. Given such enthusiasm for books on display, it might come as a surprise to learn that the special administrative region has just 1.1 public libraries per 100,000 population, according to data compiled by the World Cities Culture Forum, a network of local governments and cultural sector leaders from 41 world cities. Compare this with 2.4 public libraries per 100,000 in New York; 3.9 in London; 8.5 in Paris; and 2.9 in Tokyo.

Historically, Hong Kong is not a place where large segments of the population have the time or the means to patronize libraries - unlike cities such as Paris and London where reading for leisure is an established pastime going back centuries.

It is against this backdrop that Hong Kong's Leisure and Cultural Services Department maintains a record of the city's public library patronage. Data on library usage for the past two financial years appears to paint a bleak picture, with numbers having fallen off a cliff compared with 2019-20. But a closer inspection reveals this to be a result of pandemic-related closures and service suspensions.

Mixed signals
However, COVID-19 only exacerbated a downward slide that began years earlier. As a 2016 Legislative Council report, entitled "Challenges of Public Libraries in Hong Kong", states, the "usage of local public libraries has faced visible downward pressure over the past decade, crowded out in part by internet usage for information search and online reading".

The number of books on loan fell by a cumulative 11 percent between 2005 and 2014, while that of multimedia items on loan dropped a vertiginous 52 percent, and the number of inquiries about reference materials decreased by 14 percent over the same period.

But there are some positive signs. In response to pandemic-related closures of physical facilities, Hong Kong Public Libraries have seen a steady rise in virtual library visits and e-book downloads. The network's more than 400,000 e-books - including those brought out by major Chinese-language digital publishers HyRead and FunPark and English books from Britannica and OverDrive - were downloaded over 3 million times last year.

As of June, HKPL had 4.77 million registered borrowers, a vast collection of 13.4 million books, and 1.75 million multimedia assets. The network's outreach activities include Pop-Up Library, offering public library services in various locations, and Library-on-Wheels - a truck loaded with books visiting locations that attract people but are relatively far from public library facilities. The LCSD also promotes online reading and library activities through the videos on its Edutainment Channel website, a platform for learning about culture and leisure launched in December 2020. Over 560 educational videos were uploaded until June, with 2.8 million page views.