Subject: Highlights of the 1997 IFLA Conference, 31 August - 5 September 1997
From: Emanuella Giavarra (ecup.secr@dial.pipex.com)
Date: ke 08 loka 1997 - 17:18:30 EEST
Dear list members,
This message was originally posted to the IFLA-list.
Kind regards,
Emanuella Giavarra
-------------------------------------------
Louise Lantaigne wrote:
>
> Highlights of the 1997 IFLA Conference, 31 August - 5 September 1997
> Copenhagen, Denmark
>
> The IFLA 97 Conference will be remembered as a Conference of new
> beginnings and a Conference during which a number of major
> initiatives were taken, especially with regard to Copyright and
> Freedom of Expression and Access to Information. IFLA 97 also
> witnessed major changes within IFLA's main steering bodies: with
> a newly elected IFLA President in Mme Christine Deschamps of the
> BibliothŠque de l'Universit‚ Paris V - Rene Descartes in Paris,
> France and several new Executive Board Members. (Details of this
> appear in a separate document on IFLA-L as well as on the IFLA
> web site - www.nlc-bnc.ca/ifla).
>
> Council Resolutions
> Poised on the threshold of a new and exiting era in information,
> IFLA 97's universally appealing theme "Libraries and Information
> for Human Development" reflected the wider impact which today's
> information revolution is set to have on society as a whole, not
> just on librarians and information professionals. This was echoed
> in two major Council resolutions passed during the Conference.
> The first formally establishing IFLA's Committee on Freedom of
> Access to Information and Freedom of Expression (CAIFE) and the
> second formally establishing IFLA's Committee on Copyright and
> Other Legal Matters. (The full text of both resolutions has been
> posted on IFLA-L and IFLA's website). Invitations have been
> circulated to IFLA's Association Members to nominate members for
> the new committees and appointments will be made during the
> December Board meetings at IFLA Headquarters. Two chairs have
> already been proposed:
> they are - Marianne Scott, National Librarian of Canada, for the
> Committee on Copyright and Other Legal Matters, and Alex Byrne
> of the Northern Territory University Library in Australia
> for the Committee on Freedom of Access to Information and Freedom
> of Expression (CAIFE).
> During IFLA 97, the Danish Organizing Committee graciously
> offered to establish an office in Copenhagen, for a two year
> period, to support IFLA's activities in the area of freedom of
> expression and access to information.
>
> Record Attendance at IFLA 97
> This year, a record total of 2976 delegates from 141 countries
> attended IFLA 97. Thanks to the Danida Grant, over 150 delegates
> from the developing countries were able to attend the IFLA
> Conference this year too - a hitherto unprecedented number. For
> many, it was their first experience of an IFLA Conference. The
> Union of Danish Librarians (Bibliotekarforbundet) and
> the Union of Commercial and Clerical Employees in Denmark also
> sponsored the registration fees of 20 delegates from Russia.With
> the rapid rise in the use of the new information technologies,
> librarians now, more than ever before, are having to redefine
> themselves and re-evaluate their roles and responsibilities. The
> IFLA annual Conference grows in importance as the place where
> networking between professionals across the globe takes place
> amidst an exciting professional programme and a wealth of
> international exhibitors.
>
> Record Number of New Members registering at an IFLA Conference
> A record number of 50 Conference delegates registered as IFLA
> members during IFLA 97. Also, two Danish companies, Dansk Data
> Electronic (DDE) and the Danish Library Centre (DBC)
> joined IFLA as Patron and Sustaining Sponsors, respectively and,
> since the Conference, we are also delighted to be able to welcome
> both Sun Microsystems (US) and MCB University Press (UK) as the
> most recent additions to the IFLA Sponsor category of membership.
>
> Conference Papers
> Over 150 papers were delivered, and simultaneous translation was
> provided in all of IFLA's official languages: French, English,
> Russian, Spanish and German. The full text of all IFLA 97
> Conference Papers, including 170 translations, can be accessed
> on IFLA's website at:
> http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/ifla. Papers were given on a wide range of
> themes including: "Financing and Budgeting in a time of Change";
> "ILL Protocol Standard: Interlibrary Loan in an Open Networked
> Environment"; "Cataloguing for the 21st Century"; "Issues on
> Ownership and Availability of Electronic Information"; and,
> "Public Libraries and Lifelong Learning".
>
> Guest Lectures
> Three Guest Lectures were given at IFLA 97: Sir Roger Elliot,
> Chairman of the ICSU Press, spoke about the Impact of Electronic
> Publishing on the Scientific Information Chain'; Ms Ursula
> Owen, Editor and CEO of Index on Censorship - the only
> international magazine for free expression, spoke about
> Censorship, access to information and freedom of expression; Ms
> Esther Sibanyoni, Woman of the Year and Librarian at the State
> Library of Pretoria, South Africa, spoke about the many community
> projects she has set up since the state of emergency in South
> Africa. The full text of these papers will be published in the
> October/November issue of IFLA Journal.
>
> Pre-Session Seminar
> This year's IFLA Pre-Session Seminar focused on "Bridging the
> Information Gap through new Technology", and was attended by 42
> librarians from the developing countries. Simulataneous
> interpretation was provided throughout the session.
>
> Workshops
> Over twenty Workshops were held, many of which proved to be
> highly innovative, such as the joint workshop between IFLA's
> Section for Libraries Serving Disadvantaged Persons and the
> European Dyslexia Association on "Access to Information: Serving
> Persons with Dyslexia" and the UDT Core Programme Workshop on
> "Introduction to Internet Metadata".
>
> Library Visits
> Delegates were able to visit to number of libraries selected from
> a list of over 35 including, among others: The Danish National
> Library for the Blind, The Danish Central Library for Immigrant
> Literature, Roskilde University Library, the Library of the Royal
> School of Librarianship, and Danish Veterinary and Agricultural
> Library.
>
> IFLA Exhibition
> This year's Exhibition welcomed 184 exhibitors representing all
> areas of the profession, including publishers, subscription
> agents, manufacturers of library software and hardware, Furniture
> and shelving specialists, etc. An Internet Bar was also made
> available to Conference delegates for use throughout the
> conference.
>
> IFLANET Unplugged CD ROM
> Thanks to the generous sponsorship of IFLA Patron Sponsor,
> SilverPlatter Ltd. and the National Library of Canada, the
> IFLANET Unplugged CD ROM was produced for the second year
> running. This CD ROM contains a frozen snapshot of IFLA's website
> and this year, for the first time, featured a "virtual
> exhibition" where suppliers and producers of library products
> exhibited some of their products. The CD ROM was given away, free
> of charge, to all IFLA Conference delegates.
>
> IFLA Journal
> A complete report on all the main events taking place at IFLA
> 97 will be published in the October/November 1997 issue of IFLA
> Journal.
>
> Future IFLA Conferences
> 1998: Amsterdam, Netherlands (16-21 August)
> 1999: Bangkok, Thailand (20-28 August)
> 2000: Jerusalem, Israel
> 2001: Boston, USA
> 2002: Edinburgh/Glasgow, United Kingdom
> 2003: A competition was announced during IFLA 97 to select the
> host country for IFLA 2003.
>
> Details on how to enter this competition to host IFLA 2003 can
> be obtained from IFLA
> Headquarters. Email: ifla.hq@ifla.nl
>
> ******************************************************************
> * IFLA-L is provided by the International Federation *
> * of Library Associations (IFLA). For further information *
> * about IFLA activities, including organization and/or *
> * personal affiliate information, contact: ifla.hq@ifla.nl *
> * *
> * URL: www.ifla.org *
> ******************************************************************
This archive was generated by hypermail 2a24 : la 27 huhti 2024 - 01:20:14 EEST