The results of the Malta Book Fund are out

The National Book Council is pleased to announce that the Malta Book Fund 2022 adjudication board has agreed on the winning submissions for this year’s Fund. Twenty-nine projects will be receiving funding for publication or translation through the Malta Book Fund.

The various strands of the Malta Book Fund are aimed at supporting culturally significant book projects that require funding due to their lack of commercial viability. The winning projects have been chosen according to a set of established criteria, including the cultural and educational value of the project and its engagement with the publishing market and target audience.

The Malta Book Fund 2022 Adjudication Board was comprised of Simone Inguanez, Dr Mario Aquilina, Dr Mario Thomas Vassallo and Katryna Storace who independently assessed each submission for completeness, costing, feasibility and cultural merit. Applications are considered to receive either full or partial funding.

The adjudicators noted that in general the quality of the submitted applications was high, which is translated in the fact that many submissions got more than the minimum 60 marks required to be eligible for funding. They also pointed out that applications which were not backed by an excerpt of the proposed project had less chance of being awarded any grant, while others, especially projects submitted for the translation grants, whose application included a thorough explanation of the target market and distribution fared better.

By the application period deadline on 30 June, the 2022 Malta Book Fund received a total of 74 eligible submissions across all strands of the Fund. The budget for the 2022 Malta Book Fund was €120,000, with €50,000 allocated to Publishing Grants for New Books, €10,000 for Publishing Grants for New Editions of

Out-of-Print Works, €55,000 for Translation Grants and €5,000 for Book Translation Pitch

Grants.

All grants awarded may support up to 100% of the proposed project up to a maximum of €5,000 for all grants except the Book Translation Pitch Grants, which may support up to a maximum of €500 per proposal. To ensure that the Malta Book Fund is able to support as many worthy projects as possible and be utilised fully, the National Book Council reserves the right to repurpose grants left unused from one category to the other.

Applicants who fail to receive funds in a particular year are not barred from applying again during the next call for applications with the same project or a different one.

The NBC will be contacting the winning applicants for the signing of a beneficiary’s contract allowing for an 18-month period from the date of signing to publish the book.