Question Period Note: Canada Book Fund

The 2021-2022 Grants and Contributions envelope for the Canada Book Fund is $43.1M. This includes a $500,000 supplement from Canada’s Creative Export Strategy to support Canada’s Guest of Honour presence at the 2021 Frankfurt Book fair and $6M to support the sustainable production and distribution of accessible digital books.
Budget 2021 included an additional amount of $39.3 million over two years to Canadian Heritage to support the Canadian book industry. This includes the addition of $32.1 million over two years to help bookstores increase online sales. It also includes $7.2 million in 2021 2022 to promote Canada’s book industry at the Frankfurt Book Fair, the world’s largest trade fair for books, and $11,4M in recovery funding for the book industry.

• The Canada Book Fund provides approximately $36,6M directly to some 300 Canadian book publishers and industry organizations each year. In addition, in 2021-22, $6 million is allocated to the Canada Book Fund to support the production and distribution of accessible digital books, and $500,000 to support the export of Canadian books.
• In Budget 2021, the government announced its intention to allocate an additional $32.1 million over two years to help bookstores increase online sales. The budget also included $11.4 million over two years in recovery funding to support publishers and to increase promotion and access to Canadian books in underserved communities.
• Budget 2021 also included a new investment of $7.2 million to promote the Canadian book industry and support Canada’s presence as guest of honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair this past October.

• The Canada Book Fund (CBF) is the Government's principal measure in support of Canadian books. It aims to ensure access to a diverse range of Canadian-authored books in Canada and around the world.
• The CBF provides annual funding of approximately $36.6M through two streams: Support for Publishers (SFP) and Support for Organizations (SFO). SFP ($31M) provides funding to Canadian-owned publishers for the production and marketing of Canadian-authored books. The SFP stream includes a budget envelope of $400,000 for internships and business planning. SFO ($5.6M) provides funding to book industry organizations and associations for collective projects that strengthen industry infrastructure and develop the market for Canadian books.
• Program funding flows to approximately 300 publishing businesses and not-for-profit industry organizations in over 80 cities in all 10 provinces and in one territory (Nunavut).
• Each year, publishers supported by the Program produce about 6,500 new Canadian-authored books, employ approximately 2,500 Canadians and generate $400M in sales of Canadian authored books, which includes export sales of more than $120M.
Initiative on accessible digital books
• Budget 2019 announced an investment of $22.8M over 5 years (2019-20 to 2023-24) to support the sustainable production and distribution of accessible digital books by Canadian independent publishers through the CBF. In 2021-22, the CBF will allocate $6M as part of this initiative.
Creative Export Strategy
• The CBF received an additional $500,000 per year (2018-19 to 2022-2023) from the Creative Export Strategy to promote Canadian creators in foreign markets.
Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Canadian book publishing industry
• The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in financial pressures for Canadian publishers and other industry players, such as bookstores and distributors. The temporary closure of bookstores resulted in a significant reduction in book sales across the country for the 2020 Spring season, despite a surge in online sales. At the peak of the pandemic, the drop in bookstore sales reached 70%.
• Following the reopening of booksellers, book sales have picked up. In fact, in the French-language book market, 2020 sales in independent bookstores exceeded those in 2019 by 5.2%. In the English-language book market, sales of books have also picked up but remain slightly below their 2019 level (-4%).
• The Canadian book industry is also facing transportation cost challenges and is being impacted by disruptions in global supply chains.
• As part of Phase 1 of the Emergency Support Fund, the CBF provided emergency payments equivalent to 25% of amounts received in 2019-2020 by recurring recipients of the Program. The emergency payments totaled over $8.7M.
• Additionally, $1M from Phase 1 was transferred to Phase 2 in order to support new SFP applicants that would have been eligible for funding under the program’s regular budget.
• As part of Phase 2 of the Emergency Support Fund, temporary funding for book distribution was introduced. The Support for Distribution (SFD) component of the CBF was designed to provide emergency financial relief to Canadian book distributors. With a budget of $10M for 2020-21, the SFD supported the Canadian book industry by helping Canadian book distributors maintain their operations and support the sale of Canadian books. This support helped maintain a robust book supply chain, ensuring access to a diverse range of Canadian books. The Recovery Fund for Arts, Culture, Heritage, and Sport Sectors will provide $11.4 million over two years (2021-22 and 2022-23) to support publishers and to increase promotion and access to Canadian books in underserved communities.
Canada’s presence as Guest of Honour country at the Frankfurt Book Fair
• In July 2020, the Government of Canada and the Frankfurter Buchmesse agreed to postpone featuring Canada as Guest of Honour country until the 2021 Frankfurt Book Fair.
• Budget 2021 provided $7.2 million in 2021-22 to promote Canada’s book industry at the Frankfurt Book Fair, the world’s largest trade fair for books, last October.
Supporting the increase of online sales
• An increasing number of consumers, Canadians and those abroad, are buying books online. In order to compete in a highly competitive environment dominated by e-commerce giants (e.g. Amazon), Canadian booksellers and publishers must review their business models, innovate and make strategic investments. Budget 2021 included $32.1 million over two years to support the efforts of the book industry and help increase sales of Canadian books online.

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