Charter for Accessible Publishing

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The Accessible Books Consortium promotes the production of e-books and other digital publications in accessible formats such as braille, audio or large print for persons who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise print disabled.

The growing availability of e-books and other digital publications provides an unprecedented opportunity for persons with print disabilities to become the readers of such publications and for them to enjoy an ever broadening diversity of books. Without diminishing the importance of other ways of delivering accessible content, publishers and authors are eager to explore and develop the advantages that e-books offer.  Ensuring that more e-books are fully accessible, however, will only happen if publishers, authors and other stakeholders focus on this issue at a practical level.

Our objective is to make our e-books accessible to all.

With this objective in mind, we, the signatories to this Charter, hereby commit to:

1. stating our accessibility policy on our web-site, including adherence to this Charter;
2. nominating a senior manager who will be responsible for accessibility;
3. raising awareness among, and provide technical training for, relevant staff;
4. designating and publicising a point of contact in our organization to assist persons with print disabilities to access our publications;
5. testing our digital publications for accessibility, incorporating appropriate feature descriptions and metadata;
6. monitoring our progress in this area;
7. promoting the adoption of accessibility standards throughout the supply chain; and
8. supporting national and international collaboration with organisations representing persons with print disabilities so as to increase the availability of publications in accessible formats.

Contact us if you wish to become a signatory to the Charter for Accessible Publishing.