19^th National Book Week Festival 2010

The National Book Week Festival was celebrated from 25^th to 28^th of November, 2010 at Blue Pearl Hotel, the Central Library as well as in the districts of Biharamulo and Tunduru Book Week planning and Coordination meetings started early June 2010 with the election of Mr. Abdallah Hassan as a chair and Ms. Hobokela Magale for the position of a coordinator.

It was not easy to fundraise for the 2010 Book Week due to the presidential elections. BAMVITA struggled under great strain to make sure that the Book Week would be held. In support all stakeholders joined hands and worked tirelessly to make sure that the Book Week event would happen. BAMVITA appreciates the efforts of book industry stakeholders and private sectors who made the book week successful.

2010 Book Week and Book Fair were a great success and all activities associated with the Book Fair went on quite smoothly.  The Book Week Preparatory Committee used the media extensively with members appearing at various times on Radio and Television. TBC, ITV, Mlimani TV supported us with live interviews on the TV and Radio stations.

Activities during the Book Week included a book exhibition, rural outreach, City reading tent, book talk adult, book talk children, cultural performance, book slam and publicity. The theme for the 19 National Book week Festivals was “Soma Vitabu Ujiendeleze, Ujikomboe”. As a sign of solidarity 18 regional guests participated in the national Book Week festival, 4 from Kenya, 4 from Uganda, 2 from Rwanda and 8 EABDA officials. 31 local institutions registered and participated to the national book exhibition. 

Apart from the activities that were carried out in Dar es Salaam, BAMVITA in collaboration with TLA and CCHAUTA organized four Children Reading tents in Biharamulo District. Training of teacher librarians for 25 primary schools and book donation was implemented in Biharamulo as it was planned.

At this juncture we would like to acknowledge with many thanks the institutions that supported us to make the event a success. Special thanks should go to EABDA, HAKIELIMU and Femina HIP for their support. Also recognise the support from Mkuki na Nyota, Ben and company, TLSB and SLADS for their in kind support. Also we appreciate the contributions made by publishers in form of a discount when purchasing books for donation in Biharamulo. Last but not least to all stakeholders who by one way or another gave support.

Biharamulo District Benefits from BAMVITA/EABDA Support

The BAMVITA Executive Committee unanimously selected Biharamulo district which is located in Kagera region to be the beneficially of the 2010 EABDA/BAMVITA support. The support covered several activities including; Children Reading Tents (CRTs), Training to 25 primary school teacher Librarians, and Book donation to 25 primary schools.

TLA and CCHAUTA implemented the Children's Reading Tents on behalf of BAMVITA. The reading tents are organized for the purpose of creating conducive environment for children to enjoy reading for pleasure, participate in active story writing and telling, drawing and painting.

On the other hand TLA conducted Hands-on Training Course for Teacher Librarians from 25 Primary Schools in Biharamulo District from November 30^th to 01^st December, 2010. The training involved schools which are located in remote areas in which some of them are located more than 100 Km from the district town centre. The training aimed to equip Teacher Librarians with necessary skills to establish and develop mini libraries in their schools so as to provide essential information to both pupils and teachers eventually reinforcing reading culture in particular, and improving the quality of education in general.

A total of 4,550 copies and 73 titles of books from different local publishers were purchased for donation in Biharamulo District. Also Book Aid International (BAI) donated 675 copies of 14 different titles.  Thus a total of 209 copies of books were donated to each of 25 primary schools in Biharamulo. The Biharamulo District Education Officer was responsible for selection of 25 primary schools which benefited from the whole exercise basing on the criteria which were given to him in advance. The selection criterions were that the school should be in remote area with high illiteracy and poverty rate. Also were accessibility to library and other reading material is difficult.