Brussels, 08/09/2011 (Agence Europe) - The digitisation of cultural works will be at the heart of discussions by culture and audiovisual ministers when they meet on Friday 9 September in Warsaw for an informal meeting. The meeting will provide an opportunity for ministers to hold an exchange of views on national digitisation programmes, the stages still to be covered, the obstacles that hamper development of the process and complementary measures to be envisaged on a European scale. The question of copyright, which necessarily comes up whenever there is discussion on placing cultural works online, will also be on the agenda. Commissioners Androulla Vassiliou and Michel Barnier, responsible for culture and the internal market respectively, will take part in the debates, and recommendations issued by the high level group of experts on digital libraries will be tabled to fuel discussion. Such recommendations consider the Europeana Digital Library as centralising European cultural heritage and call on member states to speed up the process for placing works online, especially by fostering public-private partnerships. “Preservation of cultural heritage for future generations should be an imperative for every society”, said Vassiliou. Barnier recalls, for his part, the need to implement an appropriate framework for copyright in this digital era and calls on all parties concerned to take part in the consultation underway on the Green Paper on online distribution of audiovisual works. The informal meeting will be held as part of the European Culture Congress which on 8-11 September will gather, in Warsaw, over 300 artists and players from the cultural world. (I.L./transl.jl)