IBBY-Yamada 2021: Cameroon

IBBY Cameroon:  Imagine mon livre, mon univers - the challenge of developing a children’s book culture in Cameroon.

Cameroon has one of the lowest rates of books for children of all of French-speaking Africa and even then “school reading” is given priority over “literary reading”. Imagine my book, my universe /Imagine mon livre, mon univers is a series of workshops and a conference with the goal of immersing children in a universe/book and to encourage children in their energy and creativity to shape their environment and their society. The first step was to build the capacities of the selected actors (teachers, authors, illustrators, librarians, parents) in aspects of a reading culture (editing, publishing, writing and illustration, use of books in schools and in libraries) where the Central African comic book author, Didier Kassaï and the Gabonese publisher, Venant Debomane, were invited. This was followed by podium and then participants distributed their knowledge into urban areas and rural communities throughout Cameroon under the guidance of IBBY Cameroon.