The adoption of the Treaty of Marrakech, currently in the Parliament, ensure the access of blind people to rights such as education, information and social inclusion.
The treaty was signed in June 2013 by 50 countries, among them Uruguay, at the Diplomatic Conference of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in Marrakech, Morocco.
The treaty addresses a “book famine” by requiring its contracting parties to adopt national law provisions that permit the reproduction, distribution and making available of published works in accessible formats through limitations and exceptions to the rights of copyright rightholders.
It also eliminates the customs and tariff barriers, and allows sending of works in accessible formats between authorized entities and / or visually impaired people.
Works covered by the treaty are: Literary and Artistic Text, notation and / or related illustrations that have been made public by other means, books, newspapers, magazines, and other similar texts and musical scores. It excludes movies.
Benefits society as a whole
Minister of Education and Culture, Ricardo Ehrlich, said the quality of society "is measured by the ability of each person to access their rights."
He said the treaty "will not only benefit a minority that has these disabilities, but also enhance the whole society."
The Secretary of State emphasized the need to "move forward on this issue to generate more new rules and regulations that favor people with visual disabilities."
People with visual disabilities can access only 1% of the books published in the world.