On the terrace of the Villa La Torrossa at Fiesole, site of the June Fondazione LIA and APACE project conference on the European Accessibility Act. Image: Publishing Perspectives, Porter Anderson
By Porter Anderson, Editor-in-Chief | @Porter_Anderson
See also:
In Italy, Working ‘APACE’ on the Eve of Europe’s Accessibility Act
Italy’s LIA and APACE: Accessibility Programming at Fiesole
Europe’s APACE: Only One in Four Publishers Produces Accessible Ebooks
Accessibility: Italy-Based Fondazione LIA Hits Its 10th Anniversary
‘The Book Everyone Can Read’
As you may recall reading here, the Milan-based Fondazione LIA‘s “APACE” project drew a packed house to its two-day conference on the European Accessibility Act. That event, set at the Villa La Torrossa in heat-waved Fiesole, was perfectly timed to the June 28 coming-into-force of Directive 2019/882 after a five-year runway for the book business and other industries to prepare for its new requirements in terms of accessibility, in reading, for those with visual impairments.
Since LIA secretary general Cristina Musinelli and APACE project director Elisa Molinari became involved with the first European-region steps in this direction earlier in this century, the development of the foundation (LIA stands for Accessible Italian Books) has gathered increasing gravitas, recognition, and respect for its leadership in the principles of the new act, which seeks to have more than 100 million print-impaired blind, visually impaired, and dyslexic people in the EU “choose among all the publications available on the market.”
As daunting a task as this is, the intent has flourished, in part because of the creation in 2014 of Fondazione LIA by the Association of Italian Publishers (Associazione Italiana Editori, AIE) and the Italian Union of the Blind and Visually Impaired (UICI). Musinelli, Molinari, and their team have made Fondazione LIA easily one of the preeminent authorities on the new Accessibility Act, as was attested to by the more than 100 professionals who arrived from many parts of the world for the June European Accessibility Summer School.
On-hand were representatives of companies including Amazon, Kobo, Bookwire, and the Mondadori Group— library and university press leaders in Finland, Denmark’s Politikens, Germany’s Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels, Germany’s publishers and booksellers association, and the publishing elements of the Lithuanian Audiosensory Library.
At the end of July, it was learned that Molinari’s APACE project has been named a finalist in the 2025 International Excellence Awards for accessible publishing, that competition run by the Accessible Book Consortium, which is hosted by the World Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva (WIPO).
What started in 2014 as an effort to catalogue accessible Italian reading—now a collection of tens of thousands of titles—has actually expanded to reveal and serve what the World Health Organization says are more than 285 million people who are blind or otherwise visually impaired. What may be fewer than 100 countries today have national copyright laws that include special provisions for such citizens.
So today’s news—that three major international book-publishing industry associations, leaders in their own spheres—have joined Fondazione LIA is a profound cheer for the world accessibility movement, one that offers true force multipliers to the work based in Milano.
Three Major New Organizational Members of Fondazione LIA
As the foundation is stressing, the importance of the entry of these new members into its work “further strengthens LIA’s international positioning, confirming its key role as a reference in promoting accessibility throughout the publishing value chain and building a shared culture on technological innovation and inclusion.”
“Together, we can help build a publishing ecosystem that is increasingly accessible and capable of responding to the global challenges of inclusion.”Cristina Musinelli, Fondazione LIA
Collaboration with other entities, institutions, and qualified partners—”activating synergies with key players to advance technologically advanced projects with high social impact”—has long been one of LIA’s levers for success.
Mussinelli is quoted on the news, saying, “The entry of these three prestigious organizations into the Foundation network is an important signal: it shows that the work we carry out to promote accessible publishing is internationally recognized and shared by key players in the field. Together, we can help build a publishing ecosystem that is increasingly accessible and capable of responding to the global challenges of inclusion.”
EDItEUR is the international nonprofit that coordinates the development of standards for electronic commerce in the book, ebook, and audiobook sectors, particularly the ONIX standard and Thema.
Graham Bell
EDItEUR—which was a participant in June’s conference at Fiesole—has more than 110 members in 25 countries committed to defining metadata, identifiers, and practices for global publishing trade.
EDItEUR executive director Graham Bell is quoted, saying, “EDItEUR has worked together with LIA since its inception, and I’m pleased to recognize and strengthen the relationship through mutual membership. LIA’s drive to improve the accessibility of digital books and other resources, and EDItEUR’s complementary work on accessibility metadata, have never been more important or more aligned.”
Leila Jones
The STM Association is the world’s leading trade association for academic and professional publishers.
With some 150 members—independent and large publishers, scholarly societies and technology innovation companies—it represents more than 60 percent of international scholarly output in English.
The association’s COO, Leila Jones, is quoted on the announcement of the new partnership, saying, “STM is proud to join Fondazione LIA and its international network promoting a culture of accessibility in publishing. This partnership reinforces our commitment to inclusive publishing, ensuring that everyone, regardless of visual ability–can access and benefit from scholarly content.”
The United States-based BISG (Book Industry Study Group) is an international organization that includes publishers, editorial and production suppliers, wholesalers and distributors, libraries, retailers and other industry partners.
It works to improve standards and research in the areas of metadata, rights management, production and distribution, subject management. BISG has more than 200 organizations and 2,800 professionals and expert in publishing in 25 countries.
On joining, Brian O’Leary, the executive director of BISG, says, “Fondazione LIA has led the way in helping the publishing community prepare, distribute, and sell accessible content. We greatly value their contributions and look forward to even deeper collaboration.”
As the specialists in the accessibility field like to say, “The most readable book is the one everyone can read.”
More from Publishing Perspectives on trends and issues involving accessibility in world book publishing is here, more on the work of Fondazione LIA is here, and more on issues and publishing in Europe is here.
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