Italy pumps €40 million into books

Rome:Italy is to inject €40 million into the country’s book industry, from bookshops to publishers, as part of a stimulus package to relaunch the economy devastated by the covid-19 emergency.

The measures are contained in a decree signed on 4 June by Italian culture minister Dario Franceschini, who announced the news on Twitter, saying the investment would support “bookstores, publishers, distributors, authors.”

The move will see triple tax credits for bookshops and boost the acquisition of books by public libraries to the tune of €30 million.

These are the first measures pushed through under the emergency cultural business fund established by Italy’s relaunch decree, with funding of €210 million this year, reports said.