Donations
Donations to Children in Crisis Fund
IBBY regularly seeks donations for projects under its Children in Crisis Fund, which provides support for children whose lives have been disrupted by war, civil disorder or natural disaster. IBBY believes that books and stories are a fundamental need that provide effective psychological relief to children children in crisis, as do food supplies, shelter, clothing and medicines.
The two main activities supported by the Fund are the therapeutic use of books and storytelling in the form of bibliotherapy, and the creation or replacement of collections of selected, appropriate books.
In addition, IBBY operates a Solidarity Fund to support IBBY Sections experiencing financial difficulties in less-developed or economically depressed countries.
Projects
Lebanon
Since 23 September, the rapidly escalating conflict in Lebanon, marked by heavy airstrikes and attacks along the southern and northern borders, as well as in the Beirut suburbs, has displaced nearly 1 million people. Among them, approximately 300,000 are children who now reside in the vicinity of schools, mosques, churches, and shelters that have opened their doors to provide shelter. The Lebanese Board on Books for Young People (LBBY) has stepped up during this crisis to support these vulnerable children by providing psychological relief and recreational activities. LBBY successfully gathered 130 volunteers from across Lebanon to work with displaced children in various regions. These volunteers play a crucial role in delivering support and distribute packages containing educational and recreational resources for the children, including books in English and Arabic and art supplies to facilitate creative expression during bibliotherapy sessions.
Turkey
In February 2023, a series of violent earthquakes shook the south-east of Turkey and the neighbouring regions of Syria, affecting 15 million people (including more than 1.7 million Syrian refugees) in 11 Turkish provinces. Since then Turkey has witnessed a major domestic migration with nearly 2 million finding refuge to almost every region of the country. Many children have been left orphans. It took no longer than 4 days after the disaster for Çocuk ve Gençlik Yayınları Derneği–IBBY Turkey to start planning an initiative to support children in the affected areas.
IBBY Turkey is currently working on the establishment of a children's library located inside a prefabricated cultural centre under construction in the town of Nurdağı, in collaboration with the local authorities of Gaziantep, one of the most affected provinces. The opening of this library is scheduled for the end of May. In July, a similar library will open in Islahiye, a town located a few kilometres away from the Syrian border, now mainly made of tents and containers. These prefabricated libraries are key as they serve as temporary learning spaces until the education programme is resumed and children are able to return to school.
Pakistan
From June to October 2022, Pakistan has seen the worst floods in country's history, killing over 1,200 and causing catastrophic destruction of houses and crops. Educational facilities were also severely affected by the natural catastrophe.
Through the Humara Kutubkhana (“Our Library”) project, the Alif Laila Book Bus Society-IBBY Pakistan is helping to build reading corners in seven schools damaged by the floods in the Sindh province.
Ukraine
A year after the beginning of the Russian war in Ukraine, the armed conflict has brought death and material, and has forced 8 million Ukrainians—90% of them women and children—to flee their country, making this refugee wave the largest in Europe since World War II.
IBBY supports the collective of Polish publishers Fundacja Powszechnego Czytania (Universal Reading Foundation), which acquires digital rights from Ukrainian publishers to provide books to displaced Ukrainian children.
Gaza libraries
Since 2008, IBBY has been supporting two children’s libraries in Ramallah and Beit Hanoun, two cities of the Gaza strip, Palestine. The IBBY libraries were destroyed in 2014 and rebuilt thanks to donations. Continuous help is needed to support the salaries of three staff members and the organisation of regular reading and drawing workshops that offer the children of Gaza a safe and dignified life.
El Salvador
El Salvador is the 'peace-time' country with the highest per capita homicide rate in the world. La Biblioteca de los sueños (‘Library of Dreams’) was created in one of the neighbourhoods where people live immersed in a climate of constant insecurity and gangs are essentially determining the fate of children. The Library creates a space where children may develop an approach to literature and art through reading and a harmonious encounter with nature.
Lebanon
The enormous warehouse explosion on 4 August 2020 caused catastrophic damage throughout Beirut, affecting schools and libraries. IBBY Lebanon (LBBY), with its years of experience in helping traumatized children, is working, together with UNESCO, with local schools to help them rebuild their libraries, including repairing the libraries, providing new books and training the librarians.
US/Mexico border
Since 2015, IBBY supports REFORMA, an affiliate organization of the American Library Association which works with migrant children placed in detention centres and shelters in the south western USA (Texas and New Mexico). Started with distribution of Spanish language books, the project now provides detained children with backs containing books, pencil papers and a bilingual “library card” introducing children to the US public library system.
Afghanistan: mobile libraries
ASCHIANA and IBBY Afghanistan have provided books and storytelling to children in camps for Internally Displaced Persons in the regions of Kabul, Herat and Mazar-E-Sharif since 2012. The projects have been materialising as mobile libraries, reading assistant training, workshops, and the establishment of two community libraries. Despite of the many restrictions generated by the takeover by the Talibans in 2021, IBBY Afghanistan continues to work providing basic education classes to boys and girls in the most depraved areas of the country.
