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3RD International Conference on African Digital Libraries & Archives (ICADLA-3) Programme
(AL AKHAWAYN UNIVERSITY, IFRANE, MOROCCO, 2016-06-21) AL AKHAWAYN UNIVERSITY
Programme
The 3rd International Conference on African Digital Libraries and Archives Digital Libraries and Archives in Africa: Changing Lives and Building Communities
(Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco, 2016-06-21) Al Akhawayn University
The corpus of Moroccan manuscripts is estimated at more than 80,000 titles and 200,000 volumes held at a number of public and private libraries—mostly religious institutions and zawāyā. These collections are invaluable both as repositories of human knowledge and memory and for their aesthetic value in terms of calligraphy, illumination, iconography and craftsmanship. Several medieval authors position Morocco as an important center in the Muslim West (al-Gharb al-Islami) for manuscript production, illumination, binding and exchange. However, except for a few scattered publications, a history of North African Arabic calligraphy (al-khatt al-maghribi) remains to be written. By providing the tools for making these collections readily accessible to the scholarly community in the Maghrib and beyond, ICT will make possible the study of North African scripts within the broader context of Arabic calligraphy and the Islamic arts of the book in general. The two main manuscript collections in Morocco are hosted at the National Library of Morocco (Bibliothèque nationale du royaume du Maroc, or BNRM, formerly General Library and Archive) in Rabat (12,140 titles), and the Qarawiyyin Library in Fez (5,600 titles, 3,157 of which in several volumes). Theses collections originated mostly from waqf (pious endowments) and state appropriation of private collections (e.g., 1,311 and 3,371 titles from the al-Glawi and al-Kattani collections respectively). They are written almost entirely in Arabic and in various scripts; Amazigh (Berber) manuscripts in Arabic script and Hebrew manuscripts constitute less than one percent of the total collections.
ABSTRACTS OF PRESENTATIONS
(2012-06-14) Amollo, Beatrice Adera; Anyanwu, Professor John C.; Azubuike, Dr Abraham; Bennett, Richard; Buys, Matthew; Bwamkuu, Africa Jumanne; Cousins, Jill; Hamooya, Chrispin; Hillebrecht, Werner; Kaddu, Sarah; Kalule, Ezra; Kagoda-Batuwa, Sarah; Kahle, Brewster; Kujenga, A.; de Vries., R.; Larsen, David; Layton, Roger; Maeder, Anthony J.; Malan, Pierre; Molefe, Chedza; Morgos, Dr Rafaa A. Ghobrial; Myers, Glenda; Aloia, Danielle; Bekwa, Phindile; Namaganda, Agnes; Namande, Ben Wekalao; Ndayisaba, Jean Paul; Onyancha, Ms Irene; Saadallah, Mr Nabil; Salanje, Geoffrey Francis; Sigauke, Delight T.; Nengomasha, Dr C. T.; Tewolde, Azeb; Zaccaria, Massimo; Wilson, Deborah; Wordofa, Teklemichael T.
Second International Conference on African Digital Libraries and Archives, abstracts of presentations
After Digitisation, What Next? Suggested Guidelines for the Sale, Reproduction and Repatriation of Digital Deritage
(2010-12-15) Thram, Diane
In order to give you a glimpse of the International Library of African Music (ILAM), its origin, and how it exists today, a DVD that briefly tells the story has been uploaded to the Internet for readers to view. In addition to information about Hugh Tracey, the founder of ILAM, and our collections, you will see performances in ILAM’s small outdoor amphitheatre. These are, first, Venda Tshikona reed pipe dancing; then a Chopi timbila orchestra from Mozambique; performance of amadinda xylophone music from Uganda; Shona mibra music; and, finally, some Pedi Dinaka reed pipe dancing. I hope this video will give you a clearer idea of Hugh Tracey's legacy for African music. To access the ILAM DVD, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtnqPaT2wv0
AN ANALYSIS OF THE VALUES, IMPACT AND BENEFITS OF DIGITISATION FOR BUILDING NATIONAL IDENTITY
(2012-06-14) Tanner, Simon
The Archival Platform, a New Networking, Advocacy and Research Initiative
(2010-12-15) Deacon, Harriet
The Archival Platform is a new research, advocacy and networking project in South Africa, initiated in May 2009 and formally launched in November 2009. The “archive” is understood in this project as material traces of the past in public/private archives and collections, heritage sites and cultural practices. The Archival Platform aims to promote public engagement with and investment in the archive through networking and information sharing. It is fostered and supported by the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the University of Cape Town (UCT) Archives and Public Culture Programme, and funded by The Atlantic Philanthropies.
Being Strategic About Digitization Projects
(2012-06-14) Azubuike, Abraham
“A digital library is an online collection of digital objects, of assured quality, that are created or collected and managed according to internationally accepted principles for collection development and made accessible in a coherent and sustainable manner, supported by services necessary to allow users to retrieve and exploit the resources”. (IFLA )
The biodiversity heritage library and African digital libraries in the global context.
(Smithsonian Institution Washington, DC, United States, 2015-05-29) Kalfatovic, Martin R.; Fourie, Anne-Lise
The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) was created in 2006 as a direct response to the needs of the taxonomic community for access to early literature. Designed with meeting these needs, the BHL was grant-funded and quickly proved its value to its target users. The original BHL organizational model, based on US and UK partners, provided a template for, first, BHL Europe, and then a series of global nodes, most recently, BHL Africa and BHL Singapore. As the BHL moved from project to a cornerstone of biodiversity infrastructure, sustainability, appropriate expansion, collaboration with national and pan-national digital libraries (Europeana, the Digital Public Library of America) became more important. Working within the unique and often challenging environments of Sub-Saharan Africa, BHL assisted in the creation of BHL Africa is an inclusive network of African libraries and institutions in Western, Eastern, Central and Southern Africa. The short term goals of BHL/BHL Africa are surveying the biodiversity content of Sub-Saharan partners, defining digitization and aggregation capacity, and delivering African content to the BHL portal. This presentation will cover principles of pan-institutional digital library development, working across multiple African institutions, address areas of growth, and formulate lessons learned through global BHL growth.
Biographical Notes on Presenters
(2012-06-14) ICADLA 2
Second International Conference on African Digital Libraries and Archives, biographical notes on presenters
Building an Online Indigenous Knowledge Library on Culture, Environment, and History: Case Study of Elimu Asilia
(National Museums of Kenya, 2016-06-22) Owano, Ashah
African communities did not record events and accounts in writing Mode of communication and transfer of IK was Oral There is lack of Kenyan community stories and information on the web Libraries have inadequate local content to contribute to global knowledge economy
Building an online indigeous knowledge Library on culture, Environment and History: Case Study of Elimu Asilia
(National Museums of Kenya, 2016-06-21) Owano, Ashah
Kenyan libraries and information centres are inadequately equipped with local indigenous knowledge (IK) content to contribute to global digital knowledge economy. Scarcity of community stories and information on the web undermines the role of librarians and other information workers, denying local communities opportunity to participate in the development of local content about their communities and encourage them to use and appreciate local library services. All over the world, indigenous knowledge has been recognized as distinct, legitimate, valuable and vulnerable system of knowledge that requires appropriate skills to handle and manage. In Kenya, like most African countries, events and accounts were transmitted orally from one generation to another. The data/information was hardly documented. This paper presents a case study of ‘Elimu Asilia’, a participatory platform for developing local content where National Museums of Kenya librarians working with researchers and volunteers interact with local communities including children in the collection, preparation, preservation, sharing, exchange and dissemination of IK on culture, environment and history for memory, national sustainability and eco-social development using information communication technologies. It is envisaged that this platform will contribute towards the reduction of digital divide, sharing of community IK and promote global online communities for indigenous knowledge.
Building Capacity for Archives and Dissemination of Information in Uganda: A Case Study of Uganda Broadcasting Corporation and Directorate of Information
(2010-12-15) Magara, Elisam
In today's information age, knowledge has become the gold standard. A great deal of information is being generated every day in central and local governments and this is likely to increase with the continued empowerment of the population. In Uganda the government has been for a long time committed towards building an integrated, self sustaining and independent national economy. For instance, there have been a number of attempts to enact laws and policies in Uganda regarding access to and protection of information including the National Records and Archives Act, 2001, the Access to Information Act, 2005, the Copyright and Neighbouring Rights Act, 2006, The Press and Journalist Statute, 1995, the Electronic Media Statute, 1995 and the Uganda Broadcasting Corporation Act, 2005. These laws been not properly utilised, nor have proper guidelines for building capacity for storage, archiving, utilisation, dissemination and use of information been put in place. Building capacity in any organisation requires considerable effort, covering restructuring systems, development of human resource and institutional capacity, and organisational structure. The aim of this study is to review the current state of the audiovisual records and materials in the Directorate of Information (DOI) and the Uganda Broadcasting Corporation (UBC), to provide a digitization strategy to enhance effective information dissemination in Uganda.
Building Online Global Access to African Cultural Heritage: DISA - An Appropriate Model?
(2010-12-15) Liebertrau, Patricia
BURUNDI ARCHIVES: POLICY AND LEGISLATIVE FRAMEWORK
(2012-06-14) Ndayisaba, Jean Paul
The paper discusses the situation at Burundi Archives in modern society, its role, development and future. It provides an overview of the current socio-political and economic environment after four decades of civil war that prevailed in Burundi, as is well known, at periods from independence in 1962 to the present. Recent research findings regarding current record keeping initiatives in the public and private sector in Burundi and their effect on service delivery are presented. Included is the recent project initiated by the International Records Management Trust through its East Africa regional research project conducted by archivists and records managers on “Aligning records management with e-Government/Information Communication Technology and freedom of information in East Africa”. The key characteristics of economic advancement in Africa are transparency, responsibility, accountability, participation of all the people, both men and women, and responsiveness to the peoples’ needs. The general intention behind this paper is to present the legal and policy framework regarding freedom of information, ICT and e-Government initiatives and national plans, records management and archives issues. Nowadays, development is to a large extent achieved through the documentation of decision processes and actions, and by making the resulting documentation accessible to the citizens. This presentation will provide an opportunity to describe key government bodies, their mandate, structure, staffing, training and role in preserving the memory of society, through, for example, the creation, management and dissemination of trustworthy records, which will further be referred to as record-keeping. The paper concludes by positing that Burundi archives are underutilized as information sources. This is partly due to professional problems like lack of recognition of archives by governments, obsolete legislation, lack of professional training and advocacy, inadequate service, and inadequate or non-existent access tools. Another factor is lack of appropriate hardware and software and user-friendly systems, lack of knowledge using information technology, costs, and the vulnerability of digital information. Finally, the paper will discuss the challenge of record-keeping and some of opportunities in the digital society.
BURUNDI ARCHIVES: POLICY AND LEGISLATIVE FRAMEWORK PPT
(2012-06-14) Ndayisaba, Jean Paul
The paper discusses the situation at Burundi Archives in modern society, its role, development and future. It provides an overview of the current socio-political and economic environment after four decades of civil war that prevailed in Burundi, as is well known, at periods from independence in 1962 to the present. Recent research findings regarding current record keeping initiatives in the public and private sector in Burundi and their effect on service delivery are presented. Included is the recent project initiated by the International Records Management Trust through its East Africa regional research project conducted by archivists and records managers on “Aligning records management with e-Government/Information Communication Technology and freedom of information in East Africa”. The key characteristics of economic advancement in Africa are transparency, responsibility, accountability, participation of all the people, both men and women, and responsiveness to the peoples’ needs. The general intention behind this paper is to present the legal and policy framework regarding freedom of information, ICT and e-Government initiatives and national plans, records management and archives issues. Nowadays, development is to a large extent achieved through the documentation of decision processes and actions, and by making the resulting documentation accessible to the citizens. This presentation will provide an opportunity to describe key government bodies, their mandate, structure, staffing, training and role in preserving the memory of society, through, for example, the creation, management and dissemination of trustworthy records, which will further be referred to as record-keeping. The paper concludes by positing that Burundi archives are underutilized as information sources. This is partly due to professional problems like lack of recognition of archives by governments, obsolete legislation, lack of professional training and advocacy, inadequate service, and inadequate or non-existent access tools. Another factor is lack of appropriate hardware and software and user-friendly systems, lack of knowledge using information technology, costs, and the vulnerability of digital information. Finally, the paper will discuss the challenge of record-keeping and some of opportunities in the digital society.
CAPACITY BUILDING ACTIVITIES ON OPEN ACCESS: THE UNITED NATIONS ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR AFRICA PERSPECTIVE
(2012-06-14) Onyancha, Ms Irene
The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, through the Division for ICT, Science and Technology, and in partnership with donors and other multi stakeholders, has played a significant role at national and regional level in facilitating development and fine-tuning of policies to improve the use of ICT application and promote knowledge access for socio-economic development in Africa. In addition ECA as an Open Access publisher contributes to a wealth of knowledge detailing on important research or decisions that have been made on the economic and social developmental aspects in Africa. This has been made available through the ECA Institutional repository currently containing 17,000 metadata records with about 11,000 linked digital files. Furthermore, ECA has established the Access to Scientific Knowledge in Africa initiative (ASKIA), a framework for bringing together scientific and socio-economic information for the African community over an interactive online portal acting as a one-stop shop to such knowledge and associated information. Different modalities are proposed in achieving the goals of ASKIA taking into consideration the information needs of users, opportunities brought by new technologies and the global trends on knowledge exchange and dissemination. Capacity building to strengthen institutional capacities to capture, manage and disseminate local content is an integral part of the programme.
CAPACITY BUILDING ACTIVITIES ON OPEN ACCESS: THE UNITED NATIONS ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR AFRICA PERSPECTIVE PPT
(2012-06-14) Onyancha, Ms Irene
The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, through the Division for ICT, Science and Technology, and in partnership with donors and other multi stakeholders, has played a significant role at national and regional level in facilitating development and fine-tuning of policies to improve the use of ICT application and promote knowledge access for socio-economic development in Africa. In addition ECA as an Open Access publisher contributes to a wealth of knowledge detailing on important research or decisions that have been made on the economic and social developmental aspects in Africa. This has been made available through the ECA Institutional repository currently containing 17,000 metadata records with about 11,000 linked digital files. Furthermore, ECA has established the Access to Scientific Knowledge in Africa initiative (ASKIA), a framework for bringing together scientific and socio-economic information for the African community over an interactive online portal acting as a one-stop shop to such knowledge and associated information. Different modalities are proposed in achieving the goals of ASKIA taking into consideration the information needs of users, opportunities brought by new technologies and the global trends on knowledge exchange and dissemination. Capacity building to strengthen institutional capacities to capture, manage and disseminate local content is an integral part of the programme.
Capacity Building in Context
(2010-12-15) Motsi, Alexio
The challenges (from an African perspective) • Lack of coherent approach • Limited understanding of the complex issues relating to digitization • Donor influence –many donors tend to enforce their own agendas • Lack of commitment at strategic levels • Legislative shortcomings • Lack of own resources • Improper prioritization
The Case for Knowledge Management Governance for Africa
(2010-12-15) Mchombu, Kingo
In organisational context KM refers to the totality of strategies aimed at creating smart organisations able to leverage knowledge from its various information and communication assets, to learn from past experiences whether bad or good and to create new value through knowledge (Menkhoff 2007). In other words, using knowledge as a strategic business resource
CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS FACING THE DIGITIZATION OF HISTORICAL RECORDS FOR THEIR PRESERVATION WITHIN THE NATIONAL ARCHIVES OF ZIMBABWE
(2012-06-14) Sigauke, Delight T.; Nengomasha, Dr C. T.
The National Archives of Zimbabwe Act (1986) has declared that historical records in particular must be protected against any destruction, defacing, alteration, mutilation or damage. Despite this, the pace at which digitization has been implemented by the National Archives of Zimbabwe and other memory institutions to ensure the protection and preservation of historical records and other valuable information materials, has been slack and ad-hoc. This paper will present and discuss the circumstances and challenges facing the country’s National Archiving institution in embarking on digitization efforts to preserve selected public and private historical records and archives-generated public registries, memory institutions and other information centres in Zimbabwe.

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