The National Book Council feels that the time has come to bring together all interested parties to discuss a strategy about book reading in our country. The Council is preoccupied by the recent statistics from Eurostat, that found that only 45 per cent of all Maltese opened a book in the last year. Compared to other European countries, this is a shame.

The idea behind the conference is that a number of people present their vision during the day-long conference. A number of people involved directly in the areas of books, education, and culture in our country will address the conference and afterwards the topics that they will bring up will be discussed in workshops.

Finally, a plenary session will build a document, the aim of which will be to suggest ways in which those with power to act can do so productively according to the wishes of the conference. A resolution from the conference might also be sent to Europe, perhaps in the form of a request for help. But all of this will be discussed in the conference itself.

The conference will take place on Saturday, 1 March, at the Coastline Hotel, Salini, and will be addressed by the President of the National Book Council Gorg Mallia, Education Minister Louis Galea, the opposition speaker for Education, Carmelo Abela, writers Professor Joe Friggieri, Trevor Zahra, Adrian Grima, a Director General of Education, Grace Grima, and publisher Joe Mizzi.

A registration form may be acquired from [email protected]. The conference will also be sponsored by Klabb Kotba Maltin.