July 3, 2014 – By decision of the Ministry of Finance, Mint of Finland released a collector coin in honour of literacy. The Lukuinto theme year of diverse literacies, supported by the Ministry of Education and Culture, will be celebrated in Finland in the 2014-2015 academic year. The Literacy collector coin is the sixth coin to be released in the Ethical collector coins series.
Finland / 10 euros / 500 silver / 10g / 28.5mm / Design: Pertti Mäkinen / Mintage: 10,000.
Several symbols used by humans to communicate throughout history are immortalised on the collector coin. As specified in the decree of the Ministry of Finance, the symbols on the obverse compose concentric circles with the symbol for infinity at the centre. The symbol is encircled by a binary circle composed of zeros and ones, followed by a circle of notes. The next circle consists of Braille. The collector coin’s reverse depicts rock paintings composed in the shape of a circle.
The Lukuinto project team received the release of the theme year’s collector coin with delight.
Finland / 20 euros / 925 silver / 25.5g / 38.6mm / Design: Pertti Mäkinen / Mintage: 5,000.
‘The Literacy collector coin portrays the variety of readers and literacies, as well as the fact that all ways of reading are important, in a fantastic manner. Multiliteracy is one of the key themes of the Lukuinto year. Our dozens of pilot projects around Finland seek to inspire people to read and produce diverse texts in a communal fashion, such as by creating animations based on a book or reading and writing on a tablet,’ says Project Manager Eeva Kurttila-Matero of the Lukuinto programme.
Literacy rate by country. Source: Andrew pmk / http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en
The Lukuinto programme aims to promote the reading hobby amongst children and young people and to reinforce the required skills.
The collector coins Multiculturalism (2013), Equality and Tolerance (2012), Protecting the Baltic Sea (2011), Children and Creativity (2010) and Peace and Security (2009) have been released previously in the Ethical collector coins series.
‘Mint of Finland is proud that, each year since 2009, it has been allowed to produce one silver collector coin championing an ethical value. These collector coins are official recognitions issued by the central government. Ethical collector coins raise domestically and internationally important subjects,’ says Henna Karjalainen, Communications Director responsible for collector coins at Mint of Finland.
For more information on this coin go to the Mint’s website.
The role of the Literacy collector coin is specified in a decree of the Ministry of Finance.
And this is the UNESCO Literacy portal.