'Reading shouldn't be a luxury' –Second Lady

The Wife of the Vice President Mrs. Matilda Amissah Arthur has called for a mental shift towards a system in the country where reading is still a luxury in many parts of the country instead of a necessity.

She said this calls for creativity as well as the political commitment from the government to arrest the problem of accessibility of books because books are the cheapest and most effective couriers and reservoirs of knowledge.

Mrs. Matilda Amissah Arthur made these remarks when she launched the 13th Ghana International Book fair 2015 at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Ridge, Accra on the theme “Professional Book Publishing and E-services: A Resource for national development.

Mrs. Amissah Arthur, who was the special guest speaker, said there can be no easy way to solving this problem than to have publishers convert story books ,text books, maps and other books into electronic forms for both adults and children.

She said as the nation continues to experience high levels of illiteracy, books can assist to overcome such problems that are likely to cause a person to suffer from ignorance and be economically disadvantaged.

The Second Lady further stated that publishers are the gatekeepers of knowledge and can contribute positively to national development because the publishing sector is closely tied to the role of education in national development.

Touching on e-books as supplementary, she said it has not only eased the access and dissemination of information but has also contributed massively to national development since inception, adding, this technology would in the long term increase the literacy rate in the country.

“It will make textbooks and story books accessible and inexpensive to many parents and it is by such investment that the country can fight poverty, diseases and conflicts. Education is the bedrock of Ghana’s development and the publishing industry is a vital link in the chain”, she stressed.

The Second Lady said in recent years there seem to have been an effort for providing various e- services in many developing countries since ICT is believed to be a considerable potential for the sustainable development of government as a result of e-services.

She said with the advent of computers and the new technologies, the scope of publishing has expanded to include electronic resources, such as electronic version of books and periodicals ,as well as micropublishing, adding that the new technologies have changed the face of publishing –we are now witnessing the print to digital migration.

She indicated that a nations development process depends mostly on its education; capacity, adding that as a society strives to improve itself while battling with the problems it encounters depends largely on its reservoir of knowledge – through books as well as its technocrats.

The chairman for the occasion, Hon Kosi Kedem, who is the Chairman of Ghana Library Authority, said as a people we must feed the mind and in so doing government must put up a lot of library center’s for reading across the country , something that when done would help the country in a long way.

He said when done it would complement the effort that the government is making by resourcing the young ones to learn hard in the area of education to become our future leaders.

The chairperson of the Organizing Committee of the 13th Ghana International Book Fair (GIBF) Mrs. Anne Yayra Sakyi said the fair is scheduled to take place at the Ghana International Trade Fair Center, La, Accra on 3rd to 7th November, 2015.

The members of the Ghana International Book Fair (GIBF) took the opportunity to donate some books to Mrs. Matilda Amissah Arthur to compliment her effort of distributing reading materials to schools nationwide.