Major delay in delivery of school books throughout the Netherlands
There have been major delays in the delivery of textbooks across the country. In some schools, half of the books have not yet been delivered, while the school year is already underway.
'Many book packages are not complete and we are inundated with phone calls and other reports. We work with all our might, but we cannot deliver what is not there.' Iddink, the distributor of school books, informs the schools, parents and students who have received incomplete book packages.
Of the XNUMX books our students need this year, roughly half have been delivered on time
And there are many, this school year. “The school books were clearly delivered to our schools much later than in previous years,” says spokesperson Marit Goosen of Ons Middelbaar Onderwijs. “There are many redirects. In other words: late deliveries.”
Twelve thousand
Alexander de Bruin, coordinator of the book fund of one of the schools of the Stichting Limburgs Voortzet Onderwijs (LVO) has also noticed this. "Of the twelve to fourteen thousand books that our students need this year, roughly only half have been delivered on time."
De Bruin has already received a number of PDFs from the publishers and distributors. “Our teachers are now copying. But this causes a lot of hassle and unrest at the beginning of the school year. As a teacher, you want to get off to a good start right away.”
Classical
According to De Bruin, the book shortage differs per publisher. “There are few problems with small publishers. I teach classical languages and all the books for my subject have been delivered. But none of the biology book from Malmberg publishers has arrived yet.”
Other large publishers and distributors also have delivery problems, De Bruin sees in practice. Incidentally, the shortage also affects MBO: various ROCs also struggle with books that have not yet been delivered.
Brand
There are all kinds of different stories about the reason for the book shortage. Anyone calling around will hear 'staff shortage at publishing houses', 'fire in a harbor in Germany' (many books are printed abroad) to 'there are still containers full of books on a boat en route from Asia'.
Distributor Studers, who is active in MBO and also has major delivery problems, says it is 'technical problems after moving the warehouse'. 'Your order may be delayed', Studers reports on its website. 'We are working hard on a solution, but this will not be possible for every order on time.'
We haven't received a single biology textbook yet
According to distributor Iddink, 'all parties are faced with problems in the labor market and in the logistics chain'. 'Publisher Noordhoff in particular has to deal with major delays,' Iddink writes to the affected students, parents and schools. 'And that has a strong effect on the entire logistics'.
Because Noordhoff is the largest publisher, explains spokesman Pieter Dubois van Iddink. "If things go wrong at Noordhoff, it goes wrong at every school and every distributor."
Rental books
Coordinator De Bruin of one of the LVO schools thinks that many of the problems are caused by changes in the market for books and teaching methods. “In the past, you mainly had rental books that could be used for a few years. Nowadays, publishers have come up with all kinds of constructions that require you to buy new books every year. Because of more up-to-date content, but I'm afraid also for commercial reasons.”
War
And if the logistics of printing and distribution do not grow with that change fast enough, delays will arise. Especially if additional problems arise, such as a staff shortage. Or the disruption of international transport flows due to corona or war. “Then things go awry,” says De Bruin: “And I suspect that this point has now been reached.”
