Public Libraries Section - Country Reports

Public Libraries Section Country Report: Germany 2002 Klaus-Peter Boettger edbi / IZB The former German library institute as decided in the year 2000 will be closed at the end of this year. All attempts to found a new substantially smaller institute, IZB = Innovation centre for libraries, have failed. The deciding opposition came from the ministers of finance of the states. http://www.bdb-dachverband.de/index2.html, look at Mitteilungen German Public Libraries With the closure of the former German library institute there has been published for 2001 the national statistics for the last time. Up till now no institution has been found that is able to take it over. In 2001 there have been 5.484 public libraries for 60,2 million residents. The population of Germany is 82,3 million. There are 98,8 million items, a circulation of 269,4 million items, 3,5 million hours open per year, 6,9 million borrowers, 84,5 million visits and 148.000 events. All figures would increase about 10 percent if you add the libraries supported by the church. The complete statistical report also including the scientific libraries is available on the web at: http://www.bibliotheksstatistik.de Beside this statistics there is a cooperative venture of the Bertelsmann Foundation and the German Libraries Association for the measurement of performance in public libraries, called BIX - the Library Index. A few central indicators are compressed into a national index to present the performance ratings in an easy-to-digest-forms. BIX was started in October 1999 and the project has been extended till 2005 also including now scientific libraries. Within the framework of the project the possibility exists of having a representative survey conducted among the citizens of the own city in cooperation with the "Infas Institute of Applied Social Research". http://bix-bibliotheksindex.de The German Internet Library This is also a cooperative venture of the Bertelsmann Foundation and the German Libraries Association. It is to be the portal with selected links selected by librarians from 65 German public libraries. The portal will open in December 2002. [http://bertelsmann-stiftung.de/project] Digital library The digibib is a project of the public libraries of Dortmund, Düsseldorf and Cologne. Under a standard surface there are a lot of information sources: library catalogues, databases from all over the world with the reference whether and where a found document is available: online, by document delivery, at a library or at an online-bookshop. Additionally there are links to online or CD-ROM databases or to extremely good websites. http://www2.digibib-nrw.de/Digibib Library associations The BDB (Bundesvereinigung Deutscher Bibliotheksverbände) represents the DBV (Deutscher Bibliotheksverband), BIB (Berufsverband Information Bibliothek), VDB (Verein Deutscher Bibliothekare), ekz.bibliotheksservice GmbH and since last year as new members Bertelsmann-Stiftung and Goethe-Institut Inter Nationes. http://www.bdb-dachverband.de Library 2007 In cooperation with the Bertelsmann Foundation and BDB a new project will start in the middle of this year: Library 2007 - the development of libraries in Germany. Aim of the project is to plumb in a study the future effectiveness of libraries in Germany for the information society, to describe the necessary changes and to initiate a national strategy. [http://www.bertelsmannstiftung.de/devision.cfm?lan=de&nld=419] Copyright law A first draft of the new copyright law is out now. The draft is closely orientated to the EU copyright directive. A lot of demands of the German library associations have been fulfilled. This is one of the results of a hearing in Berlin at the 30.11.2001. It seems that this draft will pass till the end of this parliamentary term (September 2002). http://waste.informatik.hu-berlin.de/Grassmuck/Texts/copyright-hearing.html http://www.urheberrecht.org/topic/Info-RiLi/ OECD-Study ПISA 2000" (Programme for international student assessment) The bad German results of the OECD-Study have caused a big discussion about the education policy. Although there is no word in the study about the function and importance of libraries, especially in the chapter about the skill of reading, the library associations try to play a role in the discussion and to draw the attention to the importance of school libraries. http://www.bdb-dachverband.de/index2.html look at Mitteilungen IFLA 2003 and congress (Bibliothekartag) In 2003 there will be no national congress of the library associations because of IFLA 2003 Berlin (1.-9.8.2003). All preparations are in time, organised by the IFLA 2003 office (Barbara Schleihagen, Christoph Albers). The next national congress will take place in connection with the Leipzig book fair and in cooperation with the German society of information science, DGI, in march 2004. http://www.ifla-deutschland.de/de/ifla_2003_in_berlin/


Latest Revision: September 19, 2002	Copyright © International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions www.ifla.org