Explosion in emerging countries and slow erosion in developed countries, according to World Association of Newspapers. - The written press throughout the world continues to develop but in opposite directions, the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) reports with the publication of the 2008 report on global press trends. In 2007, the written press continued its slow erosion in western countries but continues, on the other hand, to make good headway in emerging countries where readership has become more democratically available to an increasing number of citizens. Taken globally, the figures are positive: taking all nationalities into account, sales of pay newspapers rose by 2.57% in 2007 (532 million copies). During the past five years, overall sales of newspapers have increased by 9.39%. If one adds the free press to this, the WAN even reports more substantial growth to 573 million copies distributed worldwide in 2007 (i.e. +3.65% compared to 2006 and +14.3% over five years). The diffusion of “pay” dailies has increased or stabilised in nearly 80% of countries for which data is available. Over a 5 year period, it has progressed or remained stable in 75% of these countries. As in 2006, China was the country where most newspapers were sold in 2007 with 107 million copies each day, ahead of India (99 million), Japan (68 million), the United States (nearly 51 million) and Germany (20.6 million). China and India, in particular, continued to widen the gap compared to the mature markets such as the United States or the “old” Europe. Now, 74 of the 100 dailies most sold in the world are published in Asia. China, Japan and India count for 62 of them. On the US market, there is a drop of over 3% for pay newspapers, due to the collapse in evening distribution of daily newspapers. In the European Union, the fall reached 2.37% in 2007 despite the explosion of free press which now accounts for nearly a quarter of global distribution in Europe, against a world average of 7%. More specifically, dailies in 11 EU countries increased their total pay circulation in 2007. These countries are: Austria +2.12%, Bulgaria +7.20%, Cyprus +2%, Spain +0.29%, Estonia +1.09%, Greece +1.91%, Lithuania +3.55%, Malta +2%, Portugal +1.49%, Romania +3.04%, and the Czech Republic +0.18%. Diffusion has remained stable in Luxembourg. The countries with declining distribution are: Germany -2.38%, Belgium -0.49%, Denmark -2.13%, Finland -0.99%, France -0.48%, Hungary -8.27%, Ireland -0.38%, Italy 0.29%, Latvia -26.48%, the Netherlands -2.92%, Poland -11.57%, the United Kingdom -3.46%, Slovakia -5.25%, Slovenia -6.29%, and Sweden -3.49%. Elsewhere in Europe, circulation in 2007 increased mainly in Moldova (+21.20%), but also in Albania (+7.14%), Montenegro (+9.09%), Ukraine (+5.60%). It decreased in Croatia (-6.25%), Iceland (-4.76%), Macedonia (-3.57%), Norway (-2.11%) and Switzerland (-2.94%). As far as advertising goes, development was just as contrasted: advertising proceeds in Chinese papers jumped 16% in 2007. On the other hand, they fell 3% in North America, 1.4% in India, 3.4% in the United Kingdom and 0.8% in France. In the United States, Western Europe and in the Asia-Pacific region, the internet is beginning, however, to be a growing medium: - the number of newspaper websites was up 13.77% in 2007, and 50.77% in five years. According to WAN, advertising proceeds for newspapers from websites are expected to more than double by 2011 and to account for 12% of total advertising receipts. In 2007, over 532 million people bought a newspaper each day compared to 483 million in 2003, WAN indicates, saying that the average newspaper readership was above 1.7 billion people each day. The Japanese remain the most avid newspaper readers in the world with 624 dailies sold for one million adults. They are followed by Norway (580 per thousand), Finland (503), Sweden and Singapore (each 499). Turks, for their part, devote the most time to reading a paper (74 minutes per day), followed by the Belgians (54 minutes), the Finnish and the Chinese (48 minutes). (I.L./transl.jl)