IPA President, Karine Pansa, delivered speeches at the opening ceremony and the BOP Awards.
Michiel Kolman, Chair of the IPA’s Inclusive Publishing and Literacy Committee led a session on the SDG Book Club including Pansa, Irina Lumelsky of UN Publications and Lisa Lyons of Kids Can Press. Lumelsky announced the publication of the full catalogue of children’s books for all 17 SDGs across the six UN languages. You can see the catalogue here.
Pansa spoke about her experience with the Brazilian SDG Book Club seeing it as an ‘important project to reach every region… in Brazil we have 140 titles selected and this list is the official list for librarians. A very good start!’
Bologna also hosted a Spotlight on Africa stand with a session dedicated to the readers of the future chaired by Lawrence Njagi, a publisher in Kenya, the Chair of the African Publishers Network and a member of the IPA Executive Committee. He steered a whistle-stop tour through anglophone, francophone and lusophone Africa, looking at the different opportunities publishers have as the population of the continent grows.
The third day of Bologna fell on International Women’s Day and PublisHer, the initiative founded by IPA Past President Bodour Al Qasimi, hosted a session featuring Pansa, Lyons, IPA Vice President Gvantsa Jobava, and Perminder Mann of BonnierUK.
The week reflected what Pansa said in her speech at the opening ceremony: ‘In my role at IPA and previously at the Brazilian Book Chamber, when we are talking to policy makers about our sector it is really important that we can tell them about all the different types of publishing. There have been many times when I have wished I could bring them here, show them the illustrators wall, let them feel this special energy.’