Lobby group calls on EU to protect cultural diversity

French-led industry lobby group the European Coalition for Cultural Diversity (CEDC) has called on the European Parliament to adopt five objectives to give greater support the maintenance of cultural diversity in the face of the digital revolution.

The body said that the Parliament should seek to ensure the implementation of the 2005 UNESCO Convention’s objectives for the protection of culture, safeguard the notion of the ‘cultural exception’ in EU negotiations on trade deals, modernize the financing of content creation to ensure that big international internet companies took their share of the burden, defend the rights of authors and ensure that tax regimes and benefits applied to cultural goods applied also in the digital domain.

The CEDC said that the cultural sector accounted for 4.5% of the EU’s GDP and employed almost 8.5 million people.