The Working Party on Intellectual Property (IP), part of the Council of the EU representing member state governments, prepares legislation on copyright, trademarks and patents and presents the conclusions in the EU Competitiveness Council. The Working Party met in Brussels on 16-17 January 2017 to discuss inter alia EU implementation of the Marrakesh Treaty for persons with print disabilities.

Ahead of this important meeting, IFLA, EIFL and EBLIDA, representing the international and European library communities, issued an infographic and a joint statement. The infographic sets out three ways in which Europe can help end the book famine for persons with print disabilities, the fact that less than 7% of published works are made available globally in accessible formats, such as Braille, audio and large print, and digital formats: don’t make libraries pay twice, don’t impose futile searches, don’t burden us with bureaucracy.

The joint library statement entitled ‘Don’t Go Back on the Deal. No Barriers to Realizing the Promise of the Marrakesh Treaty’ is available here

Read about EIFL’s work advocating for the Marrakesh Treaty.