Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/995828
maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 20 JUNE 2018 14 TIA RELJIC THE Summer Book Festival in Gozo will be back for the second time this weekend, set up by the National Book Council and including book exhibits from nine partici- pants. The event will include readings by local authors and poets, two open mic sessions organised in collaboration with Inizjamed, guided visits to sites of interest, as well as a number of activities set up by participants. The festival will be opened by Gozo Min- ister Justyne Caruana and the executive di- rector of the National Book Council Mark Camilleri. "Personally, I dream to organise a book festival every Sunday," Camilleri told Malta- Today. "Our increasing investment in book festivals is also due to the fact that we are losing our bookshops to confectioneries and souvenir shops and thus, the need for new sources of revenue for publishers is felt more than ever." The participating publishers are Midsea Books, Farxa, Merlin, Pjattaforma, Heritage Malta, Horizons, Uptrend, SKS, and Agius and Agius. Camilleri said that the Council is increas- ing the number of book festivals in periph- eral areas and communities since many cul- tural events usually take place in Valletta, while the ones in the periphery would serve as an outreach campaign to communities with the aim of inciting interest in books and reading. "Hopefully, as bookshops are being turned into sweat and souvenir shops, book festi- vals will in the long-term become a new cul- tural and retail operation replacing the lost bookshops while simultaneously serving as an open cultural space," he said. Several cultural events and book readings are planned for the Summer Book Festival in Gozo, including readings by Gozitan au- thors. A guided tour of the houses of past Gozitan authors will also be held on Satur- day at 11am. The festival will be held at Exhibition Hall at the Ministry for Gozo in Victoria on 22 and 23 June, and will be open from 10am till 1pm and from 4pm till 7pm on both days. CULTURE Gozo Summer Book Festival back for second year President's Trust invests over €600,000 to help vulnerable youngsters THE President's Trust has invested more than €600,000 into six innovative projects and is working on three other initiatives to help vulnerable young people facing social ex- clusion or at risk of poverty, according to figures released to mark its third anniversary. This amount goes over and above the €4.5 million being pumped into The Emanuele Cancer Research Foundation, Malta's first cancer research entity announced in Novem- ber, which is a collaboration with the University of Malta, and the Fondazione Terzo Pi- lastro, Internazionale. Set up in 2015 by President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, the Trust brings together renowned and experienced businessmen, academics and professionals to create collab- orations that make a tangible impact to youngsters facing difficult situations. Trust director, Sarah Borda Bondin, said there were cur- rently nine ongoing projects and that each initiative was funded with the support of the private sector, and was well researched and costed to ensure its sustainability in making a real difference. "The Trust does not rep- licate work being done by other organisations. We're making a difference by defin- ing existing gaps – mainly in education, training and em- ployment, empowerment, and psychosocial support – and creating a safety net for those falling through the system," Borda Bondin said. "Our sponsors are our ac- tive partners. We enter into partnerships with local and international organisations to audit each project at a plan- ning stage to guarantee an ef- fective, accountable process where the outcome of every initiative is measured," she said. President Coleiro Preca, who attended the anniver- sary celebrations, thanked the Board of Trustees, and all the entities which worked closely with The President's Trust on its social projects. She al- so thanked the young people and volunteers who dedicated their time to the social pro- jects. The Trust's scope is to add value to existing services. Funds are specifically raised for each and every initiative by bringing onboard private entities and companies intent on investing in their corpo- rate social responsibility di- mension. In one of its first projects, a partnership with Blossom Foundation, The Trust suc- ceeded in providing counsel- ling to 220 children attend- ing the St Paul's Bay primary school, which has an inordi- nate number of social issues that it is successfully working on addressing. Working hand in hand with the school's administration, teachers and LSAs and two counsellors were recruited to provide the children with psy- cho-social support. However, they were so overwhelmed by the demand, that a third counsellor was recruited thanks to the backing of busi- nesses investing in this initia- tive. The project has proven to be such a success that apart from continuing to offer this service to the St Paul's Bay primary school, the Trust has also been asked to extend the service to the Naxxar middle school. Another project, which has grown from the Trust's partnership with St Jean An- tide Foundation, is Y-Assist, which focuses on providing semi-independent, support- ed accommodation to help young pregnant women and mothers, aged 18 to 24 regain charge of their lives, with the technical expertise of the UK Life Charity. Spark, mean- while is the fruit of a part- nership with the Birżebbuġa Local council and Agenzija Zgħazagħ, to build a new skate park for youngsters in the area who had nowhere to practise their sport and were endangering their lives by go- ing on the roads. The aim is to encourage these children to become active citizens within their community. Other projects include: an employment initiative to help disadvantaged youth with 51 participants in a year; Adopt A Family which helps those at risk of poverty improve their standard of living; a scholar- ship programme for students from a disadvantaged socio- economic background; Pro- gramm Tbissima, a children's community centre in Marsa; and a national readathon that will also provide the tools to help visually-impaired chil- dren. "Our reward is finally reach- ing the stage where we can actually implement the pro- ject that is making a real dif- ference," Borda Bondin said. A new skate park is being built in Birzebbuga, following a partnership between the President's Trust, the local council and Agenzija Zghazagh