Application of the Marrakesh Treaty's clauses
The Marrakesh Treaty on Enabling Access to Published Works for the Blind and Visually Impaired or Other Print Disabled became effective for the Republic of Belarus on October 22, 2020.
The international legal framework of the treaty allows authorized bodies such as libraries, educational institutions and public associations of persons with disabilities to create and distribute copies in formats accessible to beneficiaries: the blind, visually impaired, unable to read, unable to hold or handle a book due to any physical disability.
The State Committee for Science and Technology coordinates the activities of State bodies and other organizations involved in the implementation of the Marrakesh Treaty in Belarus.
A practical guide to the implementation of the Marrakesh Treaty has been created and published for libraries in our country "Getting started. Implementation of the Marrakesh Treaty norms for persons with print disabilities". The version of the guide was prepared by specialists of the EIFL, the National Intellectual Property Center, and the National Library of Belarus.
The document is written in the form of questions and answers, reflects the norms of national legislation in the field of copyright and provides explanations on the application of the Marrakesh Treaty in practice. The guide is useful for employees of libraries and other authorized bodies that provide access to information resources for users with limited ability to perceive printed information.
Implementing the standards of The Marrakesh Treaty, the National Library provides beneficiaries with blind aid for working with information resources in the reading room, at the request of blind and visually impaired users, as well as within the framework of an interlibrary subscription, at the request of libraries in the country, transforms printed documents of social networks and translates the converted copies into accessible electronic formats and performs electronic delivery of converted copies, restricting access to them by persons for whom these copies are not intended.
The most popular ones are converted electronic copies with a text layer, which are available to beneficiaries for working with screen access and voice-over programs, and copies in audio format.
A printed publication is converted into a text-based electronic document by scanning, automatic character recognition, and manual editing, where the librarian corrects grammatical errors and technical blemishes of recognition, describes drawings that are important for text perception, and translates tables, graphs, diagrams, and diagrams into text format. The generated text document is voiced using an electronic speech synthesiser to produce an instance in audio format.
The National Library is open for the exchange of experience in providing information and library services to beneficiaries through organizing meetings, familiarization sessions, excursions, master classes and participation in events dedicated to the problems of visually impaired people.
Consulting, making an order for conversion and electronic delivery of documents is carried out:
If you have any questions about experience exchange and professional development, please contact:
- tiflo@nlb.by
- by phone number (+375 17) 293 28 55, (+375 17) 293 77 03
