At 'Più libri più liberi' 10 euro vouchers for readers under 30 in Lazio
At the event dedicated to small and medium-sized publishers, from 4 to 8 December at the Nuvola in Rome, the Lazio Region is providing a ten-euro voucher with a total of 75,000 euros
A ten-euro voucher for every under-30 person in Lazio who enters the doors of the Nuvola. This is the novelty with which the Region is taking the field to support young readers and small publishers on the occasion of 'Più libri più liberi' (More free books), the national fair dedicated to small and medium-sized publishers, to be held in Rome from 4 to 8 December.
The project, realised with the Italian Publishers Association (Aie), envisages an investment of 75,000 euros. Part of it will go to the schools, the rest directly to the children. The youngest - aged 6 to 13 - will receive a paper voucher, while young people aged between 14 and 29 will be able to use a digital one, already uploaded on the 'Bella X Noi' app, the Region's youth card. All in just a few clicks, without red tape. And if ten euros are not enough to fill a backpack, they may on the other hand be enough to spark curiosity, to turn a fair into a small reading workshop. And in times like these, that is no small thing.
"Thanks to the Region of Lazio for this initiative that promotes reading among the youngest and supports the publishers exhibiting at the Nuvola," says the president of 'Più libri più liberi', Annamaria Malato. "On the one hand, it stimulates the demand for reading among the youngest, leaving it up to them to choose the titles they like best, and on the other, it supports our exhibitors at a time when the market is not easy.
Hence the value of an intervention that is clearly not monstrous from the point of view of the resources made available, but which, as the regional councillor for Culture, Simona Baldassarre, explains, also speaks of the future: 'Supporting culture and reading among young people is fundamental, because through books our children can mature, become aware citizens and develop the critical thinking on which the economy of knowledge that is the driving force of our territory is based. Similarly, the book sector is a strategic industry for Lazio, as is 'Più libri più liberi' (More books more freedom), an initiative that brings prestige to Rome, the capital of trade fairs and publishing.
