Minutes of the First Standing Committee Meeting Section on Document Delivery and Interlending

Saturday August 18, 2001 8:30 - 11:20 a.m. Boston, MA, USA

1. Attendees

(New/continuing members) Calff, Carlsson, Chollampe, Creff, Erlandsen, Fagerli, Hansen, Hanson, Jackson, Martey, Redse, Rodriquez, Rosemann, Schwersky, Smale, Street (Retiring members) Kohl, Lindh, Menil, Neal, Oscarsson, Vattulainen, Wright

Absent: Mattes, Mbewa, Paques-Ledant, Santiago, Abelsnes, Arora, Eronina, Gourlay.

2. Introduction of Newly Elected Members

The meeting began with an extended period of introductions since 12 of the 20 members of the standing committee who begin office at the end of this conference are entirely new to the committee.

3. Opening Remarks (Agneta Lindh, Chair)

The Chair took this opportunity to review some of the highlights of the section's activities during the eight years of her tenure as a member and officer of the section. Among the successes she mentioned were three projects undertaken jointly with the IFLA Office for International Lending: the introduction of the IFLA Voucher Scheme, the establishment of a regular biennial conference on Interlending and Document Supply, and the updating and republication of International Lending: Principles and Guidelines. Also high on the list was the section's sponsorship of two Discussion Groups: Reference Work (now a section) and Repository and Storage Libraries (now sponsored by Acquisitions). In addition, she listed the successful recruiting of both institutional members to the section and candidates of the Standing Committee. These successes, she concluded, would provide a firm footing for the section during the upcoming period of change in IFLA.

4. Report from the Professional Board (Chris Wright, Secretary and Chair of Division V)

CIn an attempt to demistify the inner workings of IFLA for new SC members, Chris Wright described the IFLA Professional Board, how its members were chosen, its scheduled metamorphosis into the new Professional Committee, and its role in approving programs and projects and allocating funds. IFLA is now engaged in a major review of how its conferences are planned and managed, he said, and it was likely that future conferences would be shorter and the time divided between big-name plenary speakers intended to attract a wide audience and smaller section programs designed to provide cutting-edge technical knowledge for experts. He also discussed the recent financial problems of IFLA's Core Program Offices and explained the section's concern that if the Office for International Lending (UAP Core Program Office) was unfunded it would risk the continuity of many of the section's programs.

5. Financial Report (Mary Jackson)

The section has spent virtually no money in 2001 and as of June 30 had a balance of $693.14 in its administrative funds account.

6. Report from the Information Coordinator (Carol Smale)

The National Library of Canada, which had assigned as many as five staff to IFLANet support, has announced it will no longer be able to host IFLANet at the end of this year. As IFLA HQ struggles to take over maintenance of the extensive website and to find another host institution, there has been an alarming slowdown of items being posted. Carol reported that the Information Coordinators' meeting at the beginning of the conference revealed little new information since the incoming webmaster, Sophie Felfoldi from IFLA HQ, was absent due to illness. On the positive side, she reported that the Section's "Ask An Expert" email hotline is being queried several times a month, mainly on IFLA topics, and seems to be a modest success.

7. . Election of Officers

The chair announced that one candidate each had volunteered for the positions of chair and secretary, those being Mary Jackson (USA) for chair and Poul Erlandsen (Denmark) for secretary, and asked for any others interested in these positions to declare themselves. When no other names were volunteered, the chair asked for a motion to elect the candidates by acclamation. Lone Hansen (Denmark) offered the motion, which was seconded by Penelope Street (UK). The motion was approved unanimously.

8. Boston Conference Programs

The chairs of programs and workshops to be held at the conference made brief announcements of these events for the benefit of SC members and observers who might want to attend.

9. Report on the IFLA Office for International Lending (Sara Gould)

Sara Gould briefly recounted the history and purpose of the Office for International Lending and the IFLA Universal Access to Publications Core Programme (UAP), explaining that these offices, housed in the British Library at Boston Spa, had been formed to deal with the entire range of access questions, including guidelines and best practices, not just interlending. Among the offices' recent activities are:

o Addressing the overwhelming success of the IFLA voucher scheme, which threatens to outgrow its hosts, by conducting a comprehensive survey to determine the need for vouchers in the electronic world five years hence.
Assuring that the international Interlending and Document Supply Conference continues to be a regular event on the world calendar every two years.
Producing seminars on access to publications in remote areas of the world that engage government policy makers on broad questions of access to information.
Conducting a two-year project for the European Union on the protection and preservation of materials in minority languages.
Completing a survey for UNESCO on the availability of library catalogs on the Internet for institutions in countries surrounding the Mediterranean (an aspect of UNESCO's MedLib Project for a virtual Mediterranean library).
Overseeing the updating, translation, and republication of International Lending and Document Delivery: Principles and Guidelines for Procedure, which was first published by the SC in 1954 and is the overarching agreement for the global exchange of materials.

10. Medium Term Program/Strategic Plan

After some discussion of goals and objectives for the next planning period, Mary Jackson, as the incoming chair, appointed a small working group of SC members (Creff, Gould, Hansen, Hanson, Smale, Street) to work with her on a draft Strategic Plan for discussion at the Friday SC meeting.

11. Glasgow Program

An extensive discussion of possible program topics included: the globalization of document supply sources, the expense of shipping materials across borders and oceans, the digital divide, and numerous other issues relating to international access to publications. The meeting adjourned with an interest in developing a program that might use the Danida Ghana Project as one example of the difficulties and possibilities in making information universally available.

12. Adjournment

The SC will reconvene on Friday to complete work on the Strategic Plan and the Glasgow Program

Latest Revision: January 7, 2002