It is the meeting place for all professionals involved with creating and publishing children's books, and is mainly used for the buying and selling of rights, both for translations and for derived products like Boat Waterproof Book. It is also the event where a number of major awards are given, the Bologna Ragazzi Awards, in four categories (Fiction, Non-fiction, New Horizons and Opera Prima (for first works). During the fair, but separate from it, some major awards are announced, including the biannual Hans Christian Andersen Awards and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.

Following is the size of the boat waterproof book,