BOLOGNA, Italy, March 28 (Xinhua) -- Six publishers from around the world were honored the Prize for the Best Children's Publishers of the Year (BOP) at the Children's Book Fair running in the Italian city of Bologna from Monday to Thursday.

The 2018 winners were announced by an international panel of publishers, which made its selection on the base of "their creativity, courage, and the quality of their editorial choices over the last year", according to a jury's statement.

The BOP Award acknowledges different winners according to six areas in the world: as such, the South-African Jacana Media publisher was bestowed the prize for Africa, the Japanese Fukuinkan Shoten Publishers for Asia, and the Polish Dwie Siostry publishers for Europe. In North American, the award was honored to Canadian Editions D'eux, and in Central and South America to Mexican Ediciones Tecolote. The OneTree House from New Zealand was the winner for Oceania.

The Bologna Children's Book Fair has reached its 55th edition in 2018, and is seen as a major event for publishers, authors, illustrators, and scholars involved in children's literature, and for addressing the newest trends concerning children's books.

This year, it involved 1,390 exhibitors from 77 countries distributed on 20,000 square meters of the BolognaFiere Exhibition Center, lying at the outskirts of the city.

Named as the Guest of Honor, China has taken the stage at the 2018 Bologna Children's Book Fair running in the central Italian city this week.

With a pavilion stretching over 900 square meters, almost 100 publishers attending, and some 5,000 titles of books, the Chinese presence was indeed the largest at the international event devoted to books and reading for childhood.

An image featuring a little girl and a panda reading -- under the word "Dream" -- made the Chinese logo, evoking both the endless charm of children's literature and the bright energy of China's publishing industry today.