The Impact of the Marrakesh Treaty on South African Publishers
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The Impact of the Marrakesh Treaty on South African Publishers Laetitia Cassells1
© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract The significant technological advances in reading and content provision technologies since the 1978 Copyright Act in South Africa have not been considered in the expanding exemptions to Copyright nationally. The 2017 version of the amended Copyright Act was sent back to Parliament in South Africa in June of 2020, leaving the provisions for print-disabled readers proposed by the Marrakesh Treaty unimplemented, furthering marginalisation of print disabled readers in SA. A born digital workflow is proposed to facilitate the ‘mainstreaming’ of accessible format materials, and facilitate the implementation of the treaty with minimal disruption to the local publishing industry. Keywords Accessible publishing · Copyright act · Digital workflows · Marrakesh treaty · Print disabled
Introduction The issue of accessibility for people with print disabilities has until recently not been a pressing business concern for South African publishers, primarily because aside from the also relatively recently developed audiobook accessible format materials are not commercially viable for production [22]. In terms of technological aids however, there have been great advances in the development of devices and software capable of providing access to materials for people with print disabilities [16], which could greatly alleviate the financial process involved with creating accessible digital materials for publishers. In Africa, traditionally associated with a lack of information resources and poverty the Marrakesh Treaty represented significant progress for accessible publishing, with specific focus on taking into account the special and specific needs of developing countries [33].
* Laetitia Cassells [email protected] 1
Information Science Department, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa
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Publishing Research Quarterly
Due to gender inequality, unfavourable home conditions and schooling deficiencies childhood literacy in developed countries is often not prioritised in the manner it is in more developed counties [11], which inevitably has an effect on the size and nature of the market of adult readers. Furthermore, developing countries are more likely to have a lack of nutritional and medical support available to citizens, leading (among many other factors) to a disproportionate amount of print disabled readers being represented in developing countries [35]. While the World Blind Union estimates that less than 10% of content globally is available in accessible formats [13], in South Africa print-disabled readers have access to approximately 0.5% of books published [31], largely because the development of accessible format content is not commercially viable. While the need for accessible content is thus very real in South Africa, with an estimated 32% of the disabled population in South Africa being visually impaired [4], the exis
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