In a statement, AMAL said that readers of the network - which includes the municipal libraries of 15 of the 16 municipalities in the region and the library of the University of the Algarve - will be able to access a digital platform that gives access to newspapers and magazines 'online', national and foreign.

According to AMAL, the acquisition of the service, which represented an investment of €20,000 s, will allow “to universalize and democratize access to information and knowledge, while encouraging reading”.

According to AMAL, on the occasion, “all the presidents [of the municipalities in the Algarve] recognised the importance of the measure for the communities in the region and decided to support this expense”, guaranteeing the availability of the service in the network of municipal libraries belonging to BIBAL.

The network includes the municipal libraries of 15 of the 16 municipalities that make up the Algarve, with the exception of Aljezur, the only municipality in the region that does not yet have a library.

PressReader is a platform that provides access to periodicals from more than 150 countries and in more than 60 languages, through an interface with several functionalities, including searches by title, country, language or category.

Access to the platform is possible in several ways, with library user credentials.

The Intermunicipal Network of Algarve Libraries was created in December 2018 under a cooperation protocol between AMAL, the University of Algarve and the Directorate-General for Books, Archives and Libraries (DGLAB).