CIBF 2.0 Brings a Nation Back to Reading
BY: Mariam Ismail & Salma Ahmed
@Mariam_Ismail1 & @bluesalmaa
Visitors to this year’s new-and-improved Cairo International Book Fair (CIBF) were treated like royalty.
The entire setup of the fair was upgraded for its 50th anniversary, doing away with the tents which once housed a majority of retailers and did little to protect thousands of books destroyed by sudden weather changes, including wind and rain.
The Fair relocated to a more equipped 45,000 square meter venue in New Cairo’s Fifth Settlement, divided into 723 sections with capacity for 748 publishers and 525 publishing agents.
Within days of the January 23 opening, the grounds were overflooded with visitors eager to get their hands on the latest releases and rediscover the book fair they were once so familiar with.
By February 4, the fair had managed to attract over a million visitors.
“For the book fair to get this impressive makeover for its fiftieth anniversary means that 50 is only the beginning,” said former panel host at the Cairo International Book Fair and TV presenter for the upcoming network DMC News Mohamed Abdel Rahman.
“The book fair is now on the same level as the Frankfurt Book Fair,” Abdel Rahman continued.
Hoping to encourage its citizens to read more and facilitating a large turnout, fair organizers partnered with Mwasalat Misr (Transportation Egypt), making it the official transportation sponsor. Mwasalat Misr offered up to 32 buses to transport those who wished to visit the fair until its February 5 closing.
“The change in location is definitely a smart move, though I will deeply miss the traditional set up, one which I grew up visiting year after year,” said Abdelrahman.
This year’s Fair was particularly a boon for AUC Press. In an email last week, AUC President Francis Ricciardone said that AUC Press was experiencing record sales at the Fair, often running out of stock.
But while the (CIBF) celebrated its new and improved location and variety of books available, Cairo’s traditional used books sellers, regular vendors at previous book fairs known as Soor El Azbakeya, boycotted.
“There has been tension between us and the Cairo International Book Fair for many years and leaving us out of it has been hinted a lot,” Sameh Adel, a used book seller in Soor El Azbakeya for the past 26 years, told The Caravan.
Adel claims that the organizers of the fair told Soor El Azbakeya vendors that there was not enough room to accommodate all of them in the new venue. As a result, they had to choose only 33 vendors to attend and left out 75, a sacrifice the traditional book sellers refused to make.
They decided to boycott the CIBF this year as a show of resistance, and instead, organized their own fair for those willing to trade the more newer, more spacious venue for discounts and deals on their books of choice.
“We steal away their customers and that’s the problem,” said Adel.
“Our prices are much cheaper and therefore more competitive. Especially with the economic state at the moment, a lot of people can’t afford new books so they come to us.”
However, a lot of Soor El Azbakeya vendors violate copyright law and print illegal copies of both Arabic and English books selling them for as low as EGP 20, a small fraction of the original price.
“These illegal printers ruined Soor El Azbakeya for us, we always dealt with only used books, but these illegally printed books took away our image and reputation,” added Adel.
“[The organizers of the fair] could have just restricted the illegal printers and allowed us to participate.”
