PLR in Germany

germany

PLR in Germany is financed from an annual lump sum, 90% of which is paid by the State governments and 10% by the Federal government. The size of the lump sum is subject to review on a bi-annual basis.

The amount has not changed since 2003. Negotiations for an increase were unsuccessful and in 2006 proceedings were commenced before the arbitration court of the German Patent Office. In March 2008 the arbitration court held that an increase of 14.78% from 2006 was appropriate, but this was not accepted by the government side.

The funds are paid to the Zentralstelle Bibliothekstantieme (ZBT) which operates under the guidance of VG Wort and which is responsible for their further distribution. Until the end of 2001 only collecting societies representing copyrightholders, VG WORT for literary works, VG Bild-Kunst for visual material and GEMA for musical works, were represented in the ZBT but as from 1 January 2002 they were joined by the following societies representing neighbouring rightsholders:

Gesellschaft zur Verwertung von Leistungschutzrechten (GVL) representing performing artists and phonogram producers
Gesellschaft zur Wahrnehmung von Filmaufführungsrechten (VGF)
Verwertungsgesellschaft der Film- und Fernsehproduzenten (VFF)
Gesellschaft zur Wahrnehmung von Film- und Fernsehrechten (GWFF)
The last three societies represent audio-visual producers.

Since the Copyright Law amendment of 1995 not only copyrightholders but also holders of related rights are entitled to participate in PLR. According to available statistics the share of non-book lending in Germany is 13% of total lendings. In accordance with the agreement with the federal government and the state governments, the amount allocated for books was taken as 100 and the allocation for non-book lending added to this. Therefore in 2007 100/113 of the lump sum was for book lending and 13/113 for non-book lending. The remuneration was therefore divided by the ZBT between its member societies on the basis that 88.5% of the remuneration was for books and 11.5% for non-books. The total paid by the federal and state governments in 2007 was EUR 13.27 million.

The total received by VG Wort for 2007 was EUR 9.72 million. 22.5% representing remuneration for lending by scientific and specialist libraries was allocated to the scientific department. Of the remaining 77.5%, after deduction of administrative costs, 50% went to the Autorenversorgungswerk (Authors’ Pension Fund) and EUR 5.06 million, including remuneration for the reprography of fiction (equipment levy), was distributed individually according to the loans registered to 33,300 authors and 2,020 publishers.

(updated July 2008)