Battello a Vapore

Thanks to an editorial initiative against food waste, our editor Anna Spinelli has won the 2022 Nudge Global Impact Award. During the gala evening at the Peace Palace in The Hague, in the Netherlands, an international jury listened to the presentations of the six finalist projects at the latest Nudge Global Impact Challenge and decided to give the award to Anna’s work.

The theme of the 2021/2022 edition was Balancing our planet: a clear appeal to the need to respond to the negative events affecting our planet, in primis climate change and the pandemic.

From this starting point, Anna Spinelli developed a manual to educate children aged 6 to 10 about waste in the kitchen, in collaboration with Too Good To Go, the leading app in the fight against food waste.
Besides describing how much food is thrown away around the world and the serious environmental and social effects this has, the book offers much useful advice on ways to achieve a significant reduction in kitchen waste. Recipes include a contribution from Michelin-starred chef Carlo Cracco.

The project has already been put into practice: “Il manuale antispreco di Too Good To Go”, published by Il Battello a Vapore, has been available in bookstores and online since 31 May.

Anna’s high-quality publishing initiative is also a perfect match with one of the pillars of our sustainability plan which, with regard to the environment, aims to help promote a culture that protects the planet and its eco-systems.

The Nudge Global Impact Challenge is an international personal development program for young professionals, whose purpose is to support the growth of future leaders in environmental, social and economic sustainability who will have a positive impact on the world. The initiative is organised by Nudge, a Dutch organisation that brings young talents, companies and no-profit bodies together to promote sustainability across the board.

Through the Challenge, which began in 2010, every year approximately 90 young professionals from all over the world are given the chance to meet, follow training programs and discuss leadership and sustainable development, and then go on to create and implement their own impact plan. The best plans are recognised with the Nudge Global Impact Awards and receive funding to support their implementation.

The Mondadori Group has been a member of the network of Nudge partner companies for five years. Every year, it selects its own potential sustainability leaders for the Nudge Global Impact Challenge. The initiative is one of a range of activities to foster the development of young talents, as well as Diversity & Inclusion and sustainability. Anna Spinelli is the second nudger from the Mondadori Group to win the Nudge Global Impact Award after Marta Mazza, editor of Mondadori children’s books, who won four years ago with her book “Guerrieri di sogni”.

This year’s winners besides Anna were Sanne Kruid, Peter Akkerman, Sofia Kavlin and Timothy Wabukoti.

Survey on children and reading

The results of a survey organised by Edizioni Piemme – Il Battello a Vapore for their 30th anniversary together with BVA Doxa Kids were presented during the Salone del Libro bookfair in Turin. The survey, designed to identify engagement factors that can trigger a love of reading among young people, involved 500 children aged between 8 and 11 who had read at least 3 books in the last year, and their parents (an equal number of mothers and fathers), and produced interesting findings on the development of a passion for books among boys and girls.

The basic points to emerge were as follows:

● If children develop good independent reading skills by the age of 7, reading may become a pleasant free-time activity for boys and girls. 66% of the youngsters in the survey said they greatly enjoyed reading. Reading does not seem to be a ‘duty’, it is
not described as such, but as something that piques curiosity (57%), stimulates the imagination (54%), and is associated with adventure (47%) and discovery (46%).

● The ‘right’ book is what leads to a love of reading, a book that the youngster particularly enjoyed is the trigger (36%). Equally important is the role played by the family in suggesting or giving books as gifts (34%). A more limited but nevertheless crucial role is played in this by teachers (24%). For half of the youngsters, that ‘first enthralling book’ was the spur that led them to read other books (47%).

● Yesterday’s keen readers are the parents of today’s keen readers: more than half of the parents in the survey read frequently and 46% said reading was a hobby. Many similarities between past and present emerged in the experiences of parents and their children.

● The choice of books for children is shared and negotiated with parents: 1 out of 3 said they chose books themselves, while 2 out of 3 said sometimes they chose, sometimes their parents chose. Books can be a topic of conversation with friends: 62% said sometimes and 1 out of 3 said often.

● Introducing kids to reading is due to a large extent to the oversight of parents: 61% read books with their children when they were small, 57% bought books they thought they would like, 55% talked about the books they were reading and 51% about the
love of reading in general. Mothers are more strongly engaged in all reading activities (average involvement mothers 71%, fathers 29%), with suggestions, actual purchases and conversations about books read or suggested.

● The importance of the role played by parents is strengthened by the fact that they themselves recognise the objective benefits of reading: the most important include building vocabulary (63%) and development of language skills (55%), both mentioned by mothers. In addition the development of the imagination and creativity (62%), which is particularly strong among parents with daughters (66%). Values that reading should convey include curiosity (48%) and respect (43%).

● What do the youngsters expect from a book? First, that it lets them use their imagination and go off into imaginary worlds (56%), a stronger trait among girls. It could also help them ‘learn new things’ (47%), cited more frequently by boys, and so
identify themselves with the characters (46%). Parents too express the same perception in recalling their approach to reading during their childhood, but a sense of greater engagement emerges from their memories.

● The parents’ development from children to adult readers reflects the importance of stimulating and cultivating a love of reading in small children. Perceptions change in part among adults, when reading becomes an opportunity to relax (58%) rather than a source of curiosity (48%), a desire for discovery (48%) and a pastime (46%), although love of reading is confirmed!

The great classics are back in the bookstores and the Battello a Vapore award has reached its 20th edition

To celebrate the anniversary, the collection pays tribute to some of the books that “sparked the interest” of readers in the past, which are returning to bookstores, as from May, with new graphics to appeal to present-day readers: from the delicate touch of Pinin Carpi and his famous Cion Cion Blu, loved by every generation of children, to the timeless humour of Simone Frasca, whose Bruno lo Zozzo teaches the value of friendship; from dreams about sport and growing up in Luigi Garlando’s Da grande farò il calciatore, whose successful series Gol! and Champions are also in the Battello a Vapore catalogue, to a story of bravery in defence of the weak told in La banda della III C by the great Lia Levi, an outstanding author who also produced non-fiction historical works for youngsters; from the exciting L’ultimo lupo by the late Mino Milani, who offers a profound reflection on growing up with the lightest of touches, to the unforgettable Inkiostrik, the monster every child would like to be their school-friend, created by the inventive mind of Ursel Scheffler. This year, we are also celebrating the 20th edition of the Battello a Vapore Award, which over the years has discovered many of Italy’s most popular children’s authors and continues to do so today: Pierdomenico Baccalario, Gigliola Alvisi, Daniela Palumbo, Roberto Bratti, Roberto Morgese, Luigi Garlando, up to the winner of the 2021 award, Emilia Cinzia Perri.

A brand based on timeless stories published over the last thirty years, many of which are still fond memories for yesterday’s readers while many others will appeal to the children of the present: because good books do not age.

In 1991, Italy put the spotlight on the need to respect and look after children when it signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Thirty years later, from 18 May, the volume Dalla parte dei bambini – Il libro sui diritti dell’infanzia e dell’adolescenza, published by Edizioni Piemme-Il Battello a Vapore, in collaboration with UNICEF Italia and the ICWA (the Italian association of children’s writers), is in the bookstores: an illustrated book of twenty stories by well-known Italian children’s writers, inspired by the articles of the Convention.

“For us, the best way to make people aware of the rights laid out in the UN Convention is to write stories, in contemporary settings or a more evocative dimension, about children who are still denied these rights, even in developed western countries like Italy,” observes writer and ICWA President Fulvia Degl’Innocenti in the introduction to the book. “In every story there is hope, because growing numbers of organisations and bodies are fighting to ensure these rights are fully enforced.

UNICEF is the symbol of this, and its collaboration with the ICWA at various levels including this book is a powerful reflection of synergy and shared attention to childhood.” “Il Battello a Vapore has always devoted special attention to issues of fundamental importance for children’s development and education, and taken great care in how they are narrated,” explains Lorenzo Garavaldi, General Manager of the Mondadori Libri Children’s Business Unit.“Dalla parte dei bambini is a special project for us, not only because we have the honour of working together with the ICWA and UNICEF, but also because it gives us the opportunity to tell children about self-respect and respect for others. We are never too young (or too old) to learn to live in a better world and we could not have thought of a better way of celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of the Convention than by portraying it through words and pictures.”
“On 27 May we shall be celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of Italy’s ratification of the Convention, which sets out the rights of every human being from their birth and recognises children not just as minors under the protection of adults, but as people with civil, social, cultural, political and economic rights,” says Carmela Pace, President of UNICEF Italia. “We want to thank the Piemme publishing house, the Italian association of children’s writers and, above all, the authors, who have contributed to this collection of stories, generously giving their time, creativity and skills to ensure that every child who reads this book will be able to identify with it, to find out something about themselves, to look at the world with new eyes and to develop an awareness of their rights.”
Dalla parte dei bambini (pages: 256; price: € 13.00) is a vital tool to learn about people’s rights, foster discussion and develop the awareness that every child should be listened to. The right to a name, to be listened to, to a family, to freedom of expression, thought and religion: every child is born with rights that adults must know, respect and promote. The stories of Omar who is adopted by the family of young Francesco; of Lisa, deaf from birth, who nevertheless manages to communicate with Tommaso; of Min Min, who receives a tin containing all the words she doesn’t know; of Marta who decides to stand up to the bullies to protect her classmate Milan, and many others help us to listen, to understand and to be aware of our rights.

The authors who took part in the project are all members of the ICWA. They are: Fabrizio Altieri, Cristina Bartoli, Stefano Bordiglioni, Patrizia Ceccarelli, Carolina D’Angelo, Emanuela Da Ros, Vichi De Marchi, Fulvia Degl’Innocenti, Giuliana Facchini, Chiara Lossani, Alberto Melis, Roberto Morgese, Daniela Palumbo, Angelo Petrosino, Livia Rocchi, Isabella Salmoirago, Manuela Salvi, Anna Sarfatti, Chiara Valentina Segré, Valentina Torchia. The illustrations are by Silvia Crocicchi.

Today sees the launch, within the Trade Books Area of the Mondadori Group, managed by Enrico Selva Coddè, of the Children’s Books Business Unit, which includes the publishing houses Mondadori, Rizzoli, Fabbri and Piemme with the Battello a Vapore and Geronimo Stilton brands.
The aim of the new structure is to consolidate, as well as further expand, the company’s leadership in children’s publishing.

The Children’s Books Business Unit, which will be headed up by Lorenzo Garavaldi, aims to enhance the various imprints in response to the challenges of a strategic and continuously changing market.

The new organisational structure, while maintaining the different positioning and characteristics of the individual publishing houses, will facilitate a more complete and coherent articulation of the offer. The skills, creativity and passion of the people of the publishing houses will guarantee the essential quality and innovation necessary to reach excellent results

The Editorial Director of the new Children’s Books Business Unit will be Enrico Racca and the heads of the various publishing houses – Patrizia Puricelli for Piemme Geronimo Stilton, Alessandro Gelso for Rizzoli and Fabbri Ragazzi, Marta Mazza for Mondadori Ragazzi and Enrico Racca (ad interim) for Piemme Battello a Vapore – will report directly to him.
Lorenzo Garavaldi will remain in charge of marketing.
Rights for the whole area will be managed by Laura Casonato, who is already in charge of rights for Edizioni Piemme and Sperling & Kupfer.
Press and Communications for the Children’s Books Business Unit will be overseen by Paola Caviggioli, who remains as head of Communications for Edizioni Piemme and Sperling & Kupfer.