2023-08-31 15:28:00
The Italian associations of publishers (AIE), libraries (AIB) and booksellers (ALI) urge, in a joint press release published onlinetheir government to renew in 2024, and to incorporate into the state budget, an aid fund for the acquisition of books in the amount of 30 million euros launched in 2020.
A ministerial decree signed the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic had made it possible to allocate this amount to libraries for their book purchases. Since then, the same measure has been renewed every year. The Minister of Culture, Dario Franceschinideclared in 2021 to commit to ensuring that “ this extraordinary measure becomes structural in the state budget “. A promise recalled today by the three associations representing the interprofessional organization of the transalpine book chain.
« This measure, in addition to helping libraries, has concretely supported the entire supply chain during difficult years […] We ask not to interrupt this virtuous process today and to continue to support the book world in its effort to continue to offer books at sustainable prices. “, indicate the three presidents Laura Ballestra (AIB), Ricardo Franco Levi (IEA) and Paul Ambrosini (ALI).
Purchases of packaged books
It should be noted that this aid only concerns printed works. And public reading libraries, cultural institutes or state, must place their order with at least three different bookstores located in the province or in the metropolitan city where the reading establishments are installed.
If there are not as many bookstores present in the territory in question, the library can nevertheless contact those established in the region. The three associations request that these conditions be reiterated, thus setting aside the established criterion of the most advantageous economic offer.
Finally, the AIE, the AIB and the ALI ask that it ” there is no reduction or abolition of the ordinary allocations provided for in the budgets of local authorities, as has unfortunately been reported to us in certain cases […] ».
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