On 8 December 2017, the Croatian Library Association will organise a Round Table about libraries and the local community.

In honor of International Day of Human Rights, the Commission for Free Access to Information and Freedom of Expression, in cooperation with the Library Department of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, has for the seventeenth year in a row organised a Round Table on Free Access to Information. 

Since each Round Table is dedicated to a special subject which tends to insure a free access to information and freedom of expression, and point out the obstacles in free access and the way they are removed. So far, these were several subjects, from Access to Information in Cultural Development Service, Access to Official Information, Access to Information for People with Special Needs, to the Users Rights in the Digital Environment, etc., all the way up to this year's subject, Libraries Inventiveness.

The theme of  this year's Round Table on Free Access to Information is centered around the "Innovative Library in the Local Community Service." Although a library is often imagined as a place with books and computers, today's libraries are much more. They are often meaningful, and sometimes the only cultural centres in the city or the locality. They are places of special concern for the local cultural heritage, as well as places that can help local start ups. New technology, primarily internet and mobile telephony, enabled libraries to get out of their frames and to provide what was so far impossible for the residents of remote, rural and isolated communities. Library today operates in two fields: in its own space that strives to be as attractive and convenient as possible for different types of events, as well as organizing services outside its space for the users who are disabled to visit library and use its services in a standard way. Librarians must know local opportunities and needs, keep up with the development of new technologies they can count on, and also be creative to design new services.

This year's Round Table is dedicated to new services, organized independently or in cooperation with other organisations and institutions in the local community, or services that helped gather certain population groups for common (cultural, business, etc.) interest. Their purpose is to recognize and evaluate libraries as places where members of the local community can gather, converse, hear discourses, attend a music event or see an exhibition.

Ingrid Bon, Manager Development Programmes will speak on "How Libraries can Benefit from the UN Agenda 2030".

SOURCE: Croation Library Association