This year’s London Book Fair took place from 12th-14th March and we were thrilled, that in our 70th year, we were chosen as their joint Charity of the Year for 2024, alongside the National Literacy Trust.

As one of the leading global markets for the publishing industry, The London Book Fair is a key date in Book Aid International’s calendar.  We are supported by publishers large and small, who donate over 1 million brand-new books for us to send worldwide every year and we welcome the opportunity to meet with them at the Fair and share how their donations are empowering people to build brighter futures. The partners we work with always need more books, and we always look forward to meeting with new supporters at the Fair to discuss how we can work together. 

The London Book Fair Seminar Programme provides a range of interesting and thought-provoking events and we were pleased to be asked to contribute to the conversation by hosting two panel discussions. 

• London Book Fair Seminar Programme – Book Aid International events

On Tuesday 12^th March in the Focus Theatre, we celebrated 70 years of sharing the power of books. Chaired by our President Nigel Newton, we invited Heidi Mulvey, Head of Community Engagement at Cambridge University Press and Assessment, our Vice Patron, Lord Paul Boateng and Dr Olha Mukha of PEN International to share why they choose to be involved with Book Aid International, explore the impact that donated books have had around the world and discuss how we will continue to work together in the future. This includes sending a further 15,000 books to Ukraine for their Unbreakable Libraries project, as announced at the Fair.

On Wednesday 13^th March we were in the Sustainability Hub where we discussed our latest campaign Generation Reader and the social impact of donated books. During this session, chaired by our Vice Chair Robert Sulley, we were joined by from Dr Michiel Kolman, Senior Vice President at Elsevier and Reem Jassem, Special Initiatives Manager at the Kalimat Group, to explore how donated books contribute to improving reading fluency and the achievement of the SDGs, in particular SDG 4, quality education for all. Our Head of Programmes, Samantha Sokoya, introduced our Generation Reader programme, which aims to provide a generation of young Africans with 1.5 million books, 300 reading spaces and 1,500 newly trained teachers and librarians by 2030.

It is very good to see Book Aid International chosen as LBF’s joint Charity of the Year, in their 70th anniversary year. The work they do with the books donated by UK publishers, getting books to the remotest and most marginalised communities around the world, is transformational. I hope that even more publishers will partner with Book Aid International this year.

Nigel Newton, Chief Executive of Bloomsbury Publishing and President of Book Aid International

Our President Nigel Newton, hosted a drinks reception on the Bloomsbury stand, which gave us the opportunity to say a huge thank you to the UK and international publishers, with whose support we are able to send over 1 million books every year to people who would otherwise have nothing to read. 

If you would like to explore how we can work together to do even more to share the power of books with readers worldwide, please email our Head of Operations and Acquisitions, Brian Martin at brian.martin@bookaid.org.  

We’re looking forward to celebrating the power of books with you.