The ABC Global Book Service provides libraries for persons with disabilities known as Authorized Entities (AEs), with the ability to search, order and exchange accessible format copies of works across borders at no cost. This secure cloud-based platform enables participating AEs to pool their collective resources and expand their own collections by sharing their respective catalogues and accessible format copies of works with each other.
The Service now includes 151 participating AEs, with more than 50 percent of all AEs located in developing countries or LDCs (visit our website for the list of AEs that signed the agreement to join the Service). The ABC catalogue has about 1.2 million titles in 80 languages available through the AE Application (including 120,000 braille titles of which there are 17,000 braille music scores). These titles are available for cross-border exchange for those AEs located in countries that have both joined and transposed the provisions of the Marrakesh VIP Treaty into national law.
ABC also offers a Beneficiary Application at no cost to participating AEs or their patrons. The Beneficiary Application gives patrons of participating AEs located in countries that have both joined and transposed the provisions of the Marrakesh VIP Treaty the ability to search for, and immediately download, accessible format copies of works contained in its catalogue. There are over 540,000 accessible format copies (including 5,500 braille music scores) available for immediate download in the Beneficiary Application by persons who have print disabilities.
Through a collaboration with Dolphin Computer Access, a UK-based developer of accessibility software, the ABC Beneficiary catalogue is now available in Dolphin EasyReader App. EasyReader is a user-friendly app available for free on iOS, Android, and Windows.
For those AEs located in countries that have not yet joined the Marrakesh Treaty, or that have not yet transposed the provisions into national law, the ABC Global Book Service has about 25,000 titles (primarily in English and French) available for cross border exchange further to permissions granted by publishers.
How AEs use the Global Book Service
AEs expand their own collections by downloading titles produced by other AEs from the Global Book Service (individually or in batches), thereby avoiding duplicating transcription efforts by checking existing availability, and meeting beneficiary demand for languages they do not produce themselves.
AEs can also add the ABC catalogue into their own platforms and apps using the ABC API, providing seamless access to the ABC catalogue in their own user interface environments.
How AEs share their files for inclusion in the Global Book Service
AEs can share files with ABC in several simple ways, regardless of collection size or technology. ABC can work with metadata in almost any format, from a simple Excel sheet to MARC21, which can be emailed or shared with us in an automated way. Book files themselves can be uploaded to ABC singly or in bulk, via the ABC AE Application interface, SFTP client, or by sharing a web service or an API with ABC.
File formats available in the Global Book Service
AEs can receive and share the following file formats of accessible titles via the Global Book Service: electronic braille, contracted, un-contracted or both; braille sheet music; all DAISY formats (DAISY Audio only, DAISY Text only, DAISY Audio with text, and intermediate DAISY formats which can be used to create other alternative formats); accessible EPUB 2 and EPUB 3; and MP3, MS Word (doc and docx) and PDF, providing they include appropriate accessibility features.
Usage reports
To help AEs track distribution of their accessible titles, ABC provides self-serve usage reports in the AE Application that let each AE see which titles from their own collection were downloaded by other participating AEs and patrons, along with download counts per title. The reports are anonymised (no patron names) but identify the participating AE where the download occurred.
In accordance with Article 5 of the Agreement signed with WIPO, the AE must submit annual statistics (via a form in the AE Application) of the number of accessible books downloaded from the Global Book Service that are delivered to their own beneficiaries and eligible third parties.
EBU Member Countries participating in the Global Book Service (as of March 31, 2026)
AE Application
Forty-four AEs in 30 EBU member countries have AEs which have signed the AE Agreement to participate in the Global Book Service, in: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine and United Kingdom. A further two AEs in EBU member countries are currently in the process of integration, in: Italy and Slovenia.
Beneficiary Application
Twenty AEs in 14 EBU member countries are making the Beneficiary Application available to patrons, in: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, France, Greece, Ireland, Latvia, Malta, The Netherlands, Portugal, Switzerland and Ukraine, and others are in the process of doing so. ABC gladly provides full support to AEs in making B2C available to their patrons.
More information contact or visit the Accessible Books Consortium website.