The first and seminal report of 2002 noted that more books were translated into Spanish each year than had been translated into Arabic over the past eight centuries. The 2003 report noted that fewer than 50 Arabic books a year make it into another language.
So it was striking to attend this year's London Book Fair and see Arab publishers and writers taking pride of place, with Saqi books and the literary magazine Banipal both prominent.
There was a special stand for the foundation of Dubai's Sheik Makhtoum, who has launched a project to subsidize the translation and publications of 1,000 books a year into Arabic.
The Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage has launched a parallel project, called Kalima, to subsidize the translation and publication of Arab works into other languages.
Such state-backed ventures are probably essential at this early stage, but if the increased literary opening is to endure it will need the support of the private sector and of independent publishers, which means it will have to become financially viable.
That is the extra dimension that book fairs can help to deliver.
Much of the credit for this new prominence of Arab publishing must go to the British Council and the London Book Fair, who have jointly launched a campaign to promote not just the English-Arabic literary connection but a wider entry for Arab publishing into the global market.
They have launched a series of seminars for Arab publishers on the role of book fairs and the trading opportunities they offer. Ten British publishers were taken to the Cairo Book Fair to learn the nature of the Arabic market and how Arab publishers operate.
There will always been isolated successes like Nobel prize winners and Egyptian author Alaa al-Aswani whose marvelous sprawling saga of the lives of people in a Cairo apartment house, "The Yacoubian Building" has been translated into 21 languages including English.
The key will be to make such successes commonplace rather than extraordinary, and the giant Penguin publishing house is hoping for a breakthrough with the young Saudi author Rajaa al-Sana, whose "The Girls of Riyadh," which comes out in paperback in June, will capture global readers' imaginations.
The tale of four young Saudi women and their dreams of romance has been a controversy, a success in some Arab countries, and frowned on in others.
Forty Arab writers were invited to the London Fair to give lectures and seminars, to meet international publishers and agents and to forge personal connections with British writers. Arab publishers and the Kalima project organized a series of sessions with literary agencies and publishing houses from around the world.
With a few more imaginative ventures like this, the next UNDP report on Arab human and cultural development could read far more positively.