The Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, since last summer and with the start of the paper market crisis in Iran, has entered the paper market by establishing the “Paper Management Task Force” as the government’s responsible body for managing and controlling price fluctuations. This was done in order to facilitate cooperation between higher government institutions involved in imports, including the Ministry of Industry, the Central Bank, and the private sector, in importing paper with government currency. However, in April of last year, Hossein Entezami, the senior assistant to the Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance, announced widespread financial violations by 130 trading companies that had imported paper with government currency and then sold the majority of these imports in the free market. According to Entezami, in 2018, more than 260,000 tons of paper were imported with government currency, but only 10% of these purchased papers reached media and publishing consumers. The government of Hassan Rouhani, in a fruitless decision, announced that

Question: Considering that you have been active in the publishing industry in Tehran for years, how do you analyze and evaluate the performance of the government, specifically the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, in managing the crisis that has occurred in the paper market?
Publisher: The Ministry of Guidance, specifically the Cultural Deputy and the Publishing Department, operate based on their own normal standards for carrying out existing bureaucratic procedures for delivering publications and media from private and small publishers. In reality, they do not have the ability or desire to support production or provide a specific quota for publishing productions. The growth of these problems in the printing and publishing industry and the paper market has always been accompanied by temporary and alleviating measures by these institutions, such as providing temporary quotas for purchasing paper from a few government-affiliated distribution companies at slightly lower (half) rates than the free market price of paper, or government paper quotas at the old rate, also due to the Publishers’ Union and after complicated administrative processes and obtaining necessary permits. Despite promises of support plans such as providing low-interest production loans to private publishing institutions or government book purchases (such as in the 1380s), or delivering high print runs of each published title from independent and private publishers (such as organizational and government

Question: As reported in the news, some publishers have been able to disrupt the supply and distribution system of paper in the market by having special connections with government agencies and creating monopolies. Are you aware of these created monopolies as a publisher?Publisher: Private or government-affiliated institutions have monopolized the import and supply of paper, which they cannot or do not want to distribute at approved rates. As a result, this intentional lack of market control has led to a large volume of paper items being imported at free exchange rates by importing companies and intermediaries, including large and then small-scale distributors, without any supervision of essential goods regulations. These paper items are then sold at unusual and non-union-approved prices. This government announcement, made by the Ministry of Commerce, is for the production of paper-requiring goods (packaging, box-making, labeling, and other mass-produced items for various purposes), which practically has no effect on the consumption of paper for media publications, especially for private and small-scale printing and publishing. It is suspected that many companies with licenses or affiliations with government officials have control over the import of paper. The accumulation of paper by government warehouses and the multitude of private-based paper importers are the main factors behind these

Question: Is the distribution of large amounts of paper to 4 publishers in the form of subsidies by Asghar Amiri Nia, the manager of advertising and promotion of Quranic activities at the Ministry of Guidance, last month, in exchange for these publishers printing only 11,000 copies of the Quran, also considered a part of the government’s inability to control the paper market?
Publisher: This has always been a part of government policies to promote values through affiliated publishing institutions and government advertising in the form of publications and books; for all private cultural institutions, this is clear and there is no ability to protest against it. Even though small, cultural, or anti-establishment publishers do not receive their regular allocations, they still cannot use this imbalance as an excuse to demand their share. In addition, the Cultural Deputy of the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance not only does not feel obligated to explain this, but also presents it as a normal and necessary matter in the publishing industry of the country.

Question: According to the managing director of Ermaghan Tobbi publications, the Ministry of Guidance provides subsidized paper for each publisher based on their level of activity. This has caused individuals and publishers with more connections to receive a larger share of subsidized paper from the government. As heard in the news, some of these individuals sell the received paper in the free market for several times its original price. Has the Ministry of Guidance offered any specific solutions to prevent corruption in this matter?

Publisher: The misuse of government regulations and connections by some publishers and institutions, in order to obtain formal licenses or bypass legal procedures, cannot be ignored for real and committed publishers who do not want to take advantage of this opportunity, even though they suffer from it. Because the commercialization of book production and the high volume of similar titles or low-quality titles cannot be controlled, and at the same time, there is a legal justification for these violators. Many books are announced and receive paper quotas in their titles and print runs; institutions that benefit from this are mainly from relationships within the Publishers’ Union and the printing and publishing administration, which makes it difficult to file complaints against them. Since the Publishers’ Union is responsible for approving titles and allocating paper quotas, it has no authority over violators. In addition, there is no control over the consumption of paper quotas, and the Cultural Deputy only monitors legal violations, according to their own statements, outside the content of publishers. Therefore, there are no