An academic library partnership in the Indian Ocean region

Abstract

The emergence of a global marketplace in education offers valuable partnership opportunities. Libraries in small developing countries often do not have a critical mass of library professionals to share knowledge and to provide advice and collegial support. This case study describes a World Bank funded “Link Institution Arrangement”, which established a library partnership between an academic library in Western Australia and one in the Republic of Maldives. The authors describe the state of libraries and the emerging library profession in the Maldives. They also reveal ways in which the partners explored development issues facing an isolated academic library, shared knowledge in developing print and digital collections and planning collection development. The authors affirm the value of building enduring professional partnerships and conclude with recommendations for building print and digital collections, which may have implications for other small academic libraries.

Citation

Gross, J. and Riyaz, A. (2004), "An academic library partnership in the Indian Ocean region", Library Review, Vol. 53 No. 4, pp. 220-227. https://doi.org/10.1108/00242530410531848