Challenges libraries face in the cyberage

By Omotola Oyebanjo

From moderate beginnings, libraries in the Gulf and Middle East have grown steadily in their effort to meet the demands of readers and researchers in the region. For instance, in Dubai, a modest start of the Al Ras Public Library in 1963 has grown by 2012 to 8 public libraries across the city with about 462,000 books available and an electronic library in Umm Suqeim.

While the libraries in Gulf regions play catch up with the developed countries in terms of technology, they are all one in the challenges they face while meeting the needs of the 21^st century consumer.

1)      Transition to Digital Libraries: According to Dr M.R. Vaseghi, Vice Chancellor of Research & Technology for Islamic Azad University in his interview with springer.com, “The transition of physical libraries to digital libraries is the most important challenge facing universities in the Middle East; all our previous efforts have been focused on creating a physical library, purchasing printed resources and so on.”  This transition is critical in ensuring the continued effectiveness of libraries as the world seeks new and innovative ways to access and share information and resources.

2)      Gap between catching up to technology advancement and savvy users

Librarians are faced with the task of updating themselves to the latest available technology and e-resource platforms to best serve the millennial generation that has grown up with these advancements as part of their daily life. This generation knows how to access the information and wants it fast, but can the libraries match up?

3)      Access to New Resources & Books: The process of ordering new materials for many libraries is very time consuming. It also takes a long time for these books to get delivered causing libraries to function on limited and sometimes outdated resources. The need for dependable suppliers and sellers who will deliver the right quantity on time continues to be an important challenge.

4)      Absence of Collaborative Operations: Many libraries in the Gulf and Middle East work in silos without any collaborative effort. For instance, it is not unusual to find a single University having multiple libraries each servicing its own unique faculty with no collaborative efforts across libraries. This can lead to duplicate purchases or make searching of data difficult as resources may not be pooled across the University.

5)      Difficulty of Sourcing relevant Resources: With the explosion of EBooks and digital resources, libraries are faced with difficulty of sourcing and distributing relevant resources for their faculty and students. This therefore drives libraries to seek out the best sources and platforms from where the most outstanding EBooks can be bought and accessed in order to ensure they meet their consumer’s demands.

On the plus side, with new and innovative resources directed at the education sector, libraries are left with a larger pool of options to add to their virtual bookshelves. Integrating e-textbooks, rented journals and learning videos for school children into the library’s website seamlessly is catching on fast.

It is evident the future of libraries lie in its digital assets where users can have remote access and not in big rooms lined with unending shelves stocked with bound books.


The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to Dibaj

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