Ludmila Putin opens a festival of school libraries - "Bibliobraz"

The wife of the Russian President, Ludmila Putin, has opened a festival of school libraries - "Bibliobraz." The aim of the festival is to draw the attention of the whole country to "the difficult but so important profession of librarians," said the wife of the President, as addressing the participants in the festival.

Ludmila Putin pointed out that school libraries "never had rich book funds and were not the most popular place for the meetings of schoolchildren." "We would like to attract attention to libraries and, following the example of the European countries and the USA, to make them the venue of schoolchildren and parents' meetings, to fill these libraries with modern literature and journals, and to establish the Internet connection in each school library," said the wife of the President.

Education Minister Vladimir Filippov noted, talking with reporters, that last year the government allocated money for purchasing compilations of Russian classical literature in one hundred volumes for all school libraries. These books have already been brought to the school libraries. At the present time, the Education Ministry plans to supply these libraries with compilations of the works by Russian and foreign writers in one hundred volumes.

The festival of school libraries which will be held from September 30 to October 2 in Moscow, will be attended by the winners of the school-library contest from all regions of Russia, the workers of literature and art, schoolchildren and representatives of the Education Ministry.

The task of the festival is to attract the attention of the public to the problems of riving library work in educational establishments, to the restoration of school libraries as social and cultural centres and the restoration of the favourable influence of books on the formation of man's personality.

This festival will be attended by the wives of the President of Russia, Armenia, Bulgaria, the United States and the Prime Minister of Great Britain.

In the context of the festival, a round-table conference will be held in the library of the Russian President in the Kremlin with the participation of Ludmila Putin and the wives of the heads of foreign states. The theme of this roundtable conference will be "the favourable influence of books on children upbringing."