Manga Piracy Costs Trillions, Official Translations Lag

A significant problem plagues the manga industry: a substantial gap between global demand and the availability of authorized translations. Shoko Ugaki, CEO of manga translation company Orange, highlighted that the demand for manga worldwide is vastly greater than the officially translated content.

Orange's survey indicates that while around 30,000 manga titles exist in English translation, pirated versions number approximately five times more. This imbalance, where fans often resort to unofficial translations, represents a major bottleneck for the industry. The financial repercussions are immense, with close to 6 trillion Japanese yen lost due to piracy last year alone.

This piracy directly impacts creators and publishers by withholding income and revenue. Consequently, publishers struggle to allocate sufficient budgets for new works, affecting the entire manga industry's ecosystem. Orange aims to address this through its platform, emaqi, by scaling official translations of previously unavailable titles in a creator-friendly manner.

Ugaki believes the rising popularity of anime, such as Netflix's 'One Piece,' is fueling the appetite for official manga translations globally. While anime has introduced many to manga, the full appeal of manga itself is still being discovered overseas. Efforts are needed to educate global audiences about the connection between anime and manga, as this flow is not widely understood outside Japan.