The Director-General of UNESCO, Audrey Azoulay, has named Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) as World Book Capital for 2025.
Following Accra (Ghana) in 2023 and Strasbourg (France) in 2024, UNESCO and the World Book Capital Advisory Committee chose Rio de Janeiro as the World Book Capital 2025, as it demonstrated the value of its literary heritage and had a clearly defined vision and action plan to promote literature, sustainable publishing, and reading among young people utilising digital technologies.
In accordance with the priorities expressed in the World Book Capital Charter, Rio de Janeiro’s proposal emphasises the potential to affect social change – for example, through literacy, education, and poverty eradication – and bring long-term economic benefits linked to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
This is the first time that a Portuguese-speaking city has been designated World Book Capital.
The UNESCO World Book Capital Advisory Committee comprises representatives from the European and International Booksellers Federation (EIBF), the International Authors Forum (IAF), the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA), the International Publishers Association (IPA), and UNESCO.
As the twenty-fifth city to bear the title since 2001, Rio de Janeiro follows Madrid (2001), Alexandria (2002), New Delhi (2003), Antwerp (2004), Montreal (2005), Turin (2006), Bogota (2007), Amsterdam (2008), Beirut (2009), Ljubljana (2010), Buenos Aires (2011), Erevan (2012), Bangkok (2013), Port Harcourt (2014), Incheon (2015), Wroclaw (2016), Conakry (2017), Athens (2018), Sharjah, (2019), Kuala Lumpur (2020), Tbilisi (2021), Guadalajara (2022), Accra (2023) and Strasbourg (2024).
For more information about the World Book Capital Programme, visit their website World Book Capital Network.