Recently, the unity ministry was reported to have launched a mechanism to gauge the reading culture among Malaysians known as the National Reading Index (NRI).

That raised two questions in my mind.

Firstly, why was the unity ministry spearheading this endeavour?

It would make more sense for the education and the higher education ministries to take it up. After all, these ministries have a wider reach among the country’s children, youth, teachers and academic staff.

Secondly, what practical value does the NRI offer? Indices like these have little bearing on the cultivation of genuine reading habits. In truth, you can already tell whether someone’s a voracious reader within five minutes of meeting them.

So let’s put aside the NRI for now. Allow me to suggest how the reading culture can be cultivated both in schools and universities.

In schools, the first thing that we should look at is what types of books are available in their libraries. Are there enough engaging titles, including in fiction, academic themes and leisure reading?

I can vividly recall how my own primary school’s library was filled with storybooks of every kind, including Disney magazines and volumes of hardcover books about the world, adorned with glossy pictures and large fonts to make them both attractive and readable.

Do our school libraries have books to excite both teachers and students alike?

Next, how many books does each teacher and student borrow annually? Is there a mechanism in place to identify avid readers—and, conversely, those who are not inclined to borrow even one?

If there is a lack of interest, is that due to the library’s infrastructure, or its administration, or simply because there is a chronic shortage of quality books?

The third question concerns time: how much of it is left in the daily lives of teachers and students for reading?

Is there space in a student’s school timetable for visits to the library or does this only happen when a teacher is unavailable or on maternity leave?

Ideally, time should be allocated for library visits at least three times a week. This reading period should be planned and not held on an ad-hoc basis.

As for teachers, has any research examined whether they have time to read at home, or are they just overwhelmed by administrative tasks?

Now let’s look at universities. Has any survey been conducted on the reading habits of lecturers with doctorates? Did these lecturers pick up even one book when they were PhD students?

Do not be surprised if there are doctors of philosophy who do not even know how to philosophise — because they merely read journals and have not been trained to think beyond them.

From experience, I’ve found that during promotion interviews, asking academics to name the books they’ve read often leads to an uncomfortable silence.

Engineers do not seem to read philosophy or books related to the social sciences, while those who study social science have no interests in the mechanics involved in making the world sustainable.

Secondly, what are the rewards for writing a book and are there sufficient allocations for universities to publish them?

Most of the country’s private universities do not even have a book publishing budget, and even if they did, it is usually merely to obtain Malaysian Research Assessment Instrument (MyRA) marks. MyRA is the system used to evaluate the research output and performance of higher education institutions.

In any case, such books are also never seriously edited and for the most part, authors end up funding the printing themselves, resulting in only a handful of copies being published.

Some public institutions nowadays print only 100 copies of a book, and their poor authors do not receive much in the form of royalties.

I have published 60 books. Along the way, I have had to learn how to sell them and earn royalties. The rule is simple: you write, you sell. University publishers are hopeless when it comes to marketing—so if you’re the author, then DIY!

As for undergraduates, I’ve had the privilege of interviewing at least 30 students with a perfect 4.0 CGPA—each shortlisted as a potential valedictorian or award recipient. Again, when asked to list the books they have read cover-to-cover, silence followed.

Nowadays, it seems you can score a 4.0 without reading a single book.

When I was an undergraduate, I read ten books on architecture and another eight on Islam and other religions. Even now I can reel off most of their titles from memory. I had read them on my own accord. They were not on any recommended reading list.

Academics should insist that students read at least one full book—ideally one authored by a lecturer. Yet this rarely happens, because in many institutions, one can be promoted to professor without having published a single book.

Here’s a challenge. Walk into any bookstore and look for books written by one of our 3,000 professors. Let me know if you can find five.

Walk into any university, I dare you, look at the cafeteria and corridors for students and lecturers carrying books around. You won’t find them.

Or look at the quality of our parliamentary debates and media commentary. Perhaps we need an index to gauge the reading habits of our politicians.

So let’s forget about the NRI. It won’t improve our reading culture.

Let’s instead reward book-writing and look at our teaching methods, assignment and examination questions.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.