Why your library matters in development: access to information, the UN and the Lyon Declaration

Lyon Declaration Press Conference, April 2014: IFLA President Sinikka Sipilä and Georges Kepenekian (First Deputy Mayor of Lyon) at Lyon City Hall

Many of you will know that the United Nations (UN) is currently reviewing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs provided a framework to help improve living standards in developing countries. Progress has been made since 2000, but there is a recognition that more still needs to be done to alleviate poverty, even in developed countries. This is why the United Nations is currently preparing a new framework to guide development for all countries after 2015 – the Post-2015 Development Framework.

Why does this matter to libraries?

It matters because libraries support development, by providing access to information to help people get an education, find a job, or live a healthier life. IFLA has therefore been paying close attention to the formation of the new framework and ensuring that policymakers recognise that there were some things crucial to development – like access to information – that libraries can help with. We have now reached a period of great importance. In July the UN produced an outcome document which set out 17 goals and hundreds of targets for the new framework. Between now and December 2015 UN Member States will negotiate what is included in the final framework, and what is not.

This is where The Lyon Declaration on Access to Information and Development comes in. Thanks to work done by IFLA and its partners, public access to information is currently included in the Outcome Document as a target for Member States to achieve. The Lyon Declaration will help us keep the pressure on Member States over the next year to ensure that access to information is included in the final framework, along with recognition of the role that information intermediaries can play in supporting development projects.  

Add your institution’s voice: sign the Declaration!

IFLA will continue to engage with all relevant UN processes but we will need your help. Sign the Declaration and add your institution’s voice to over 125 institutions and associations from within and beyond the library sector. Use the tools we will provide to meet with your government representatives, introduce the Declaration and ask them to support the inclusion of access to information in the framework. Tell them what libraries in your country can do to help meet the goals.

Join us tomorrow for the launch of the Declaration at 09.30 in the Amphithéâtre. Share the news on social media and tell your colleagues. Let’s get access to information on the agenda at the UN, and make sure libraries are part of the global development conversation.

The Lyon Declaration will be available at www.lyondeclaration.org.