Category Archives: Côte d’Ivoire

Trends in Academic and Research Libraries in Ivory Coast / Côte d’Ivoire

ACCESS TO INFORMATION AND INTERNET

Universities and high private or public schools in Côte d’Ivoire are increasingly creating libraries to support teachers and students in their university studies and research. The creation of these academic and research libraries encourages the employment of professionals in the information sciences.

Côte d’Ivoire has a national association which is the APSID-CI (Association of Professionals of the Information Sciences of documentary of Cote d’Ivoire). This association is made up of a section that brings together libraries and documentation centers for academics and researchers. This section is nothing more than the Association of Specialists in Documentary Information of Research and Higher Education of Côte d’Ivoire (ASIDRES-CI).

All the universities and public schools of Côte d’Ivoire have a library in their midst. Concerning universities and high private schools, some have them and others, no. Interviews and visits to some of these establishments indicate that the budget allocated is insufficient to cover all expenses (subscriptions to online periodicals, acquisition of new documents, office equipment and air conditioning, catering fund … ). In most of these libraries the staff is inadequate in proportion to the work to be done. But in spite of these means and conditions of work, the brave professionals of the information sciences apply themselves to do their work by aiming the satisfaction of their users who are the teachers (Professor, Doctor, Engineer) and the students.

It should also be noted that in Côte d’Ivoire, most of the library holdings in academic and research libraries are mostly composed of dissertations and often internship reports and doctoral dissertations. Today, it is difficult to access information because of document retention concerns. Some documents are not accessible due to poor storage conditions. In addition Internet access is always a luxury for developing countries like ours. University libraries and research libraries are not immune to this situation.

The ASIDRES-CI struggles to stabilize because it does not communicate sufficiently about its existence and activities, which makes it unknown to most professionals in the field of academic and research libraries.

Another remark we made is that the academic and research libraries in Côte d’Ivoire do not exchange sufficiently on documentary techniques and practices in order to facilitate collaboration between them in order not only to be more efficient and to participate in decision-making in our country. It is in this respect that library professionals, particularly those in the academic and research sectors, will be able to make progress on their level and participate in the sustainable development of our dear country of Cote d’Ivoire.

AKE Jonas F…
Bibliothécaire – archiviste
l’Institut National Supérieur des Arts et de l’Action Culturelle
firsy@live.fr / firsyl86@gmail.com