IFRRO Welcomes LATREPRO

IFRRO was delighted to welcome to its offices in February Terēze Balode-Boluža, Executive Director of Latvian RRO LATREPRO, together with LATREPRO’s legal adviser, Juris Balodis. They updated IFRRO’s First Vice-President Samantha Holman and Catherine Starkie of the IFRRO Secretariat on LATREPRO’s development - with an important increase in collections since its first collection in 2017 – as well as current copyright-related challenges.

A key concern for LATREPRO is the proposed implementation of the Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive in Latvia. IFRRO has subsequently written to Latvian Members of Parliament, in support of LATREPRO, to in particular draw attention to the damaging proposals concerning implementation of the “illustration for teaching” exception. IFRRO is calling for various changes, including to ensure there is remuneration for rightsholders for uses under the exception, in order to avoid negative consequences for local authors and publishers, as well as students.

LATREPRO also visited its mentor RRO organisation Reprobel during their visit and expressed their gratitude to Kurt Van Damme of Reprobel for his support and advice to LATREPRO over many years.