[Nfbc-info] FW: [State-affiliate-leadership-list] from IP Watch

Wed Jun 26 20:04:00 UTC 2013

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Subject: [State-affiliate-leadership-list] from IP Watch

Voices Of The Blind In Marrakesh Hope To Carry A Long Way 

Published on 25 June 2013 @ 7:25 am

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By Catherine Saez <http://www.ip-watch.org/author/catherine/> , Intellectual
Property Watch

 <http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Picture-014.jpg>
WBUMarrakesh, Morocco – Yesterday, under a scorching sun, the World Blind
Union organised an event to raise awareness about the negotiations taking
place inside the Marrakesh Palais des Congrès. Behind them, in the building,
negotiators have been at work for a week in an effort to agree and adopt a
treaty to provide visually impaired people with a broader access to books. 

Over the weekend, a breakthrough on a key issue was acclaimed by most
participants, but representatives of the blind and print-disabled were still
worried that the negotiation will only deliver a weak treaty, devoid of much
substance that can bring real change (
<http://www.ip-watch.org/2013/06/24/wipo-negotiators-reach-breakthrough-on-3
-step-test-in-treaty-for-blind/> IPW, WIPO, 24 June 2013).

The diplomatic conference of the World Intellectual Property Organization is
taking place from 17-28 June in Marrakesh.

 <http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Picture-014.jpg>
World Blind Union at WIPO diplomatic conference in Marrakesh, Morocco.

World Blind Union at WIPO diplomatic conference in Marrakesh, Morocco.

A pile of books on a table all chained together symbolically represented the
lock on the access to special format works for blind and print-disabled
people around the world. The treaty is seeking to address in particular the
current barriers to the cross-border exchange of these books.

Yesterday, the World Blind Union (WBU) distributed an invitation to
delegates in the form of a key with no indent which bore a label saying
“Unlock! Don’t Block the Treaty text.”

Maryanne Diamond, immediate past president of the World Blind Union, called
for a meaningful treaty. Taking as an example the 198 books chained on the
table, and only two unchained, she said this was the current situation of
the “book famine” for blind and visually impaired people in the world. She
urged delegates to remember for whom they are negotiating a treaty. She said
delegates should start agreeing on remaining issues, such as enabling the
direct distribution to individuals of special format works, and to ban
commercial availability from the text.

Fred Schroeder, first vice-president of the World Blind Union, said that
according to UNICEF, 98 percent of children with disabilities in developing
countries do not have access to education, or access to employment as
adults. The majority of blind people and visually impaired live in poverty,
isolation, and suffer from unemployment, not because of lack of ability or
willingness to go out and work hard, but for lack of access to basic tools,
such as literacy. He called on delegates not to only solve technical issues
but support a practical implementation that will put books in the hands of
blind children and adults worldwide.

 <http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Picture-017.jpg>
World Blind Union President Maryanne Diamond (Photo Credit: Catherine Saez,
IP-Watch)

World Blind Union President Maryanne Diamond (Photo Credit: Catherine Saez,
IP-Watch)

Jace Nair, from the African Union of the Blind, said the book famine affects
Africa very seriously, and made an appeal to the international community to
negotiate a 21st century solution to technological access to information and
knowledge, rather than negotiating a 19th century treaty that would not
serve the needs of users in Africa.

Fatem-Zohra Taifor, a visually impaired individual from Morocco, also called
for a treaty that will allow a greater access to books, attesting to her
many difficulties throughout her childhood, being thirsty for books and
unable to quench this thirst from her early years. She talked about a young
life deprived of the world of stories, adventure and evasion that could have
been provided by books. During her university years, she said, she needed
help to go to the library, help to choose her books, help to record them,
and to transcribe them into Braille.

“I spent so much time doing this that I forgot what the notion of reading
for pleasure meant,” she said.

Nowadays, she said, as a working individual having access to a computer, she
still has to digitalise books page by page with a scanner, then transform it
into an electronic file “littered with spelling mistakes, that I can finally
read with the help of my computer.”

It is a challenge, she said, to contemplate online libraries only accessible
to people who reside in a specific country. “It is still an obstacle course”
to access books, she said, even to prepare for her courses (she is a
professor). She called for countries to devise a clear treaty, without grey
areas and clauses such as commercial availability so that it can enable
equal access to reading for all people of the world.

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