Sharjah, UAE (IINA) : Books valued at AED 176 million ($48 million) were sold at the recently concluded Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF), WAM reported.

This year marked the 35th edition of the world’s third largest book fair and was the most successful to date, according to the organizers.

Held under the theme of ‘Read More,’ the SIBF 2016 hosted more than 2.31 million visitors over 11 days, with the figures breaking all previous records since the first fair in 1982. Also, the sale of books was the greatest in the 35-year history of the fair.

Hosting 1,681 publishing houses from 60 countries with approximately 1.5 million titles on display, SIBF 2016 ran from November 2 through November 12 at Expo Center Sharjah.

Ahmed bin Rakkad Al Ameri, Chairman of Sharjah Book Authority, SBA, said, “The UAE leadership’s decision to promote reading and a love of books has been an instrumental factor in making this year’s edition of the fair its most successful to date.”

The chairman of SBA stressed that the 35th edition of the book fair boosted SBA’s ambition to make SIBF the world’s number one fair, in terms of number of visitors and total sales.