Calculate correctly and sufficiently when pricing textbooks

With 17.6 million high school students nationwide, adjusting textbook prices results in huge costs and widespread impacts.

From July 1, 2024, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) will set maximum prices for textbooks to prevent publishers from setting unreasonable prices.

The cost is huge

Accordingly, textbooks will be priced according to the principle of ensuring compensation for reasonable and valid production and business costs, profits (if any) in accordance with the market level, supply and demand of goods and services, market conditions at the time of pricing and the State's socio -economic development policies and guidelines in each period.

The Ministry of Education and Training sets the maximum price, organizations and individuals trading textbooks set specific prices but not higher than the price level prescribed by the Ministry of Education and Training and must ensure compliance with the basis, principles and methods of pricing goods and services priced by the State, as prescribed in the 2023 Price Law.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Mai Hoa - Vice Chairwoman of the National Assembly's Committee on Culture and Education - said that textbooks are products that affect a large number of students, parents, and society. With 17.6 million high school students nationwide, it is clear that adjusting and regulating textbook prices is a huge expense and has a wide-ranging impact. Changing the price of a textbook is not much, but the total cost of the entire society is a very large number. Therefore, textbook prices are always a common concern of society. Before the new school year, public opinion had many opinions related to the issue of textbook prices with the common desire to have a set of books at a suitable price.

"The issue of textbook prices always gives educators a headache, having to answer many questions from the public, parents, and the media about reducing textbook prices. Therefore, by giving the Ministry of Education and Training the authority to coordinate with the Ministry of Finance to set textbook prices, the Ministry of Education and Training is exercising its rights and responsibilities towards learners. When textbook prices are reasonable, the education sector certainly will not have to face the impact of public opinion on textbook prices," Ms. Hoa affirmed.

From July 1, 2024, the Ministry of Education and Training will set the maximum price for textbooks.

Ensuring harmony of interests of all parties

Regarding pricing principles, Professor Hoang Van Cuong, member of the National Assembly's Finance and Budget Committee, said that pricing must be based on three common principles: correctness, sufficiency, and ensuring harmony of interests among parties such as the interests of learners, the interests of the education sector, and the interests of the publishing house.

According to Professor Hoang Van Cuong, pricing needs to be based on three bases. First, based on the factors that make up the product price, this is the most important basis. Second, based on the supply-demand relationship in the market. It is necessary to survey the market, assess whether this set of books has a large or small consumption scale... If using one set of textbooks, the scale is very large, but if there are many sets of books, the market share will be shared. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully evaluate the market and the supply-demand relationship to be able to price accurately and reasonably. Third, when pricing, it is necessary to regularly mention the prices of similar products on the market.

Mr. Tran Thanh Dam, Director of the Department of Planning and Finance, Ministry of Education and Training, said that although the Law on Prices has not yet taken effect, up to this point, basically all publishing houses have sent price declarations for 2024 and 2025 to the Ministry of Finance.

"On the side of the Ministry of Education and Training, we are discussing the story of coordination and review of price declarations of publishing houses. We determine that the responsibility of the Ministry of Education and Training in regulating the ceiling price of textbooks is a very important task. However, the expertise on prices currently belongs to the Ministry of Finance. The Ministry of Education and Training consulted the Ministry of Finance very early, right after the National Assembly assigned the authority," said Mr. Dam.

The Ministry of Finance has completed the decree guiding the implementation of the Law on Prices and the draft circular on pricing methods. According to Mr. Tran Thanh Dam, in the pricing method, any specific content, which has individual characteristics in the cost of compiling, publishing and distributing textbooks, the Ministry of Finance has asked the Ministry of Education and Training for comments and the ministry has sought comments from publishers as well as related information channels. From there, clarify issues that need to be specifically regulated for the cost of compiling, publishing and distributing textbooks in order to include them in the circular of the Ministry of Finance, creating a basis for publishers to develop price regulations for their textbooks.

"Regarding the method of setting ceiling prices, this is a very important task, so we have discussed with relevant agencies and exchanged with publishers to determine which costs will form the price of textbooks. Calculate correctly, calculate sufficiently but must be harmonious" - Mr. Dam informed.

Textbook prices are made up of many factors.

Associate Professor Nguyen Van Tung, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Vietnam Education Publishing House, said that textbook prices are made up of many factors, focusing on five basic factors, including: Cost of organizing the manuscript, royalty costs, production costs, circulation costs and financial costs (interest).

In the 2024-2025 school year, Vietnam Education Publishing House has reviewed sales costs and distribution costs. As a result, the price of the Connecting Knowledge with Life set has decreased by 9.6%; the price of the Creative Horizon set has decreased by 11.2% compared to the old price. For textbooks for grades 5, 9, and 12 - first published in 2024, Vietnam Education Publishing House has developed and completed the price declaration according to the price structure, the price level has decreased compared to textbooks published in previous years.

Source: https://nld.com.vn/tinh-dung-tinh-du-khi-dinh-gia-sach-giao-khoa-196240413210858315.htm