As of 22 April 2009 this website is 'frozen' in time — see the current IFLA websites
This old website and all of its content will stay on as archive – http://archive.ifla.org
The International Centre, hosted by the BibliothÀque nationale de France in Paris, sets up the overall policy, manages and coordinates activities, and promotes preservation issues among other bodies also concerned by preservation. Today, there are six existing Regional Centres respectively located in:
Each one of those Regional Centres is responsible for implanting specific actions in its region with one major goal: to ensure that library materials, published and unpublished, in all formats, will be preserved in accessible form for as long as possible: A task all the more difficult than preservation and conservation have long been the concern of specialists and have focused mainly on restoration. But times have changed: the emergence of new formats, combined with constantly evolving technologies, the variety of documents to be safeguarded and the problems raised throughout the world by the acidity of paper and the publications in digital form, have led us to concentrate mainly on preventive preservation. We are conscious that nothing efficient can be done unless we raise awareness on preservation issues among the profession and governments. Preservation is one major issue of librarianship, and as important as collecting, cataloguing or access. It should be a concern for all of us and linked to any activity of the library. In order to reach this goal we need to develop training, to publish and translate professional literature, to disseminate information, to encourage research and standardization and to work in co-operation with all other concerned bodies, so as to avoid duplication of efforts and to reduce costs.
b - Galina Kislovskaya, the Director of the recently created Regional Centre for Eastern Europe and the CIS in Moscow.
XIXth century Latin American photography has gained increased importance thanks to systematic activities that have been undertaken to locate, define, safeguard and preserve photographs.
These concerns have been translated into the idea of producing a CD-ROM with photographic pictures of Latin America and the Caribbean from the late 19th and the early 20th century.
A proposal to UNESCO was submitted to include this heritage in the "Memory of the World" programme and produce a CD-ROM. Coordination was assigned to the National Library of Venezuela as it is headquarters of the IFLA-PAC Regional Centre for Latin America and the Caribbean.
The main objective of this project was to organize, register and digitize 3,000 Latin American and Caribbean photographic images dating from late XIXth and early XXth centuries. The aim of this was to understand the photographers, their work and printing techniques, and as a consequence, make access easier to their pictures at international level.
Photographic images from ten countries in the Region had to be compiled with their corresponding technical description. All the institutions invited to participate could not be involved because of time or funding limitations. This compelled us to complete the committed number of images with a selection from the Audiovisual Archives of the National Library of Venezuela. Thus most countries in the Region could be represented in the CD-ROM. This meant that additional effort was contributed by the Audiovisual Archives of Venezuela for evaluating the pictures, within the deadline established.
The production of the 1,000 copies of the CD-ROM relied on the experience of the University of Colima (Mexico). Information will be accessed through various headings: photographer, title, country, key word, etc.
Our CD-ROM includes an introduction, academic references about the evolution of the Region, the creation of its republics, their industrial and urban development, their peoples and customs. All this information will be based on the previously unknown and unique selection of photographs and their technical description.
Contribution of the countries to the CD-ROM: 3,008 pictures
7 countries, including:
Brazil Colombia Cuba Chile Mexico Peru Puerto Rico Total |
331 425 112 56 29 416 22 1,461 |
Countries represented as a result of the contribution of the Audiovisual Archives of Venezuela:
Central America Caribbean Venezuela South America Total |
134 436 308 639 1,517 |
Like all the other PAC centres, the new Regional Centre in Moscow sticks to the goals of the IFLA- PAC core programme as they are formulated in the 1998-2001 Medium-Term Programme. These include: raising awareness of preservation issues, developing a policy of coordination, encouraging and monitoring studies, research and standardization, and educating library staff and encouraging training.
Depending on our specific environment, stress might shift from "studies and research " to "education and training" both in the range of the goals and in the number of the activities that would lead to their implementation.
The basic idea lying behind the concept of the centre in Moscow is disseminating information. Provision of information to libraries in the region is implemented in the form of publications, training courses, and conferences.
Publications stand as a prerequisite for meeting all the goals and especially the "education and training" one. Of course, International Preservation News will remain a central publication in the mailing list.
Bearing in mind that language barriers are hindering and will hinder the exchange of information between professionals, the Regional Centre will seek solutions for pulling this barrier down.
In the near future, several texts will be translated into Russian:
The Regional Centre also plans to translate four videos, namely:
There are also plans to translate the course by Wendy Smith (University of New South Wales) on distance education on preservation and mount it on the internet in 1998.
In the framework of the Joint IFLA/ICA Committee on Preservation (JICPA)a number of workshops were organized in Africa either with funding from DANIDA through ALP or from UNESCO.
We also have started various projects in collaboration with UNESCO among which a CD ROM on conservation practices and a world survey of Digitization Programmes and preservation policies in collaboration with UAP.
As you can see our scope is large. To close this rapid presentation, I'd like to give you some brief information on the Blue Shield and the International Committee ICBS created in 1996 by ICA, ICOM, ICOMOS and IFLA. The mission of the International Committee of the Blue Shield (ICBS), which has taken up the emblem of the Hague Convention of 1954 for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, is to collect and disseminate information, and to co-ordinate action in emergency situations.
The four non-governmental organisations within ICBS are joining together to provide authorities and professionals with expertise and networks in the case of armed conflict or natural disasters that could affect cultural heritage. The four organisations are also working together to organise risk preparedness at an international level and to encourage it at a local level.
And I wish all those present here to get involved either by creating national Blue Shield Committees in their own country and/or getting up rescue programme in their library. PAC will succeed in its various tasks only if you help us. For more details I invite you all to come to the Poster Session on Tuesday and Wednesday (12-14 PM).
Thank you for your attention.