The State of Worldwide Library eBook Lending

 The flow of electronic resources is largely dominated from the West for the West but the concept of e-lending is slowly catching on worldwide as libraries move to mostly digital resources.

Here’s taking a look at a study done by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions looking at other regions.

Africa

The International Publishers Association estimates that 90% of overall publishing revenue in Africa is derived from education markets. It is not a surprise that the availability of eBooks from African libraries is limited largely to university collections with an emphasis on streamed scholarly publishing content originating outside the continent. The 2013 South African Book Fair had as its focus “The future of eBooks: the impact of the digital eBook phenomenon” and the comments from publishing executives solely dealt with the education market and the potential for acceptance of digital textbooks.

Asia

eBook data reported from Asian countries indicates wide variations in library availability and use.

Apabi Chinese eBooks are published in Mainland China and its content emphasises more scholarly rather than leisure reading content.

Hong Kong public libraries report 186,497 eBook titles in their collections, 72,500 which are Apabi eBooks. The balance is made up of streamed bundle services including ebrary Academic Complete and EBSCOhost. The relatively low use of eBook collections (annual use of 1.1 per title) is attributed by library staff to the lack of leisure reading titles available and the confusing access requirements for the different databases.

A large majority of Japanese public libraries do not provide eBooks at this time.

Korean public libraries report over 3 million eBook titles available and annual expenditure of 3.6 million US dollars (2012).

Singapore reports 3,062,002 eBook titles, circulation of 8,247,966 and annual expenditure of $1,268,857 US (all

2012).

Taiwan public libraries report eBook title holdings of 255,278 (2012) and annual circulation of 562,482 (2013).

Australia/New Zealand

Public libraries in Australia and New Zealand report sustained and continuing growth in eBook provision and use:

·         State of Victoria public libraries report 298,809 eBook downloads in 2011/12 and 497,045 downloads in 2012/13 (+66%)

·         Users of the State Library of Western Australia downloaded 9,130 eBooks in January 2013 and 21,564 eBooks in January 2014 (+136%). The January 2014 loans constituted 1.4 loans per title available.

·         Users of Brisbane City Libraries downloaded 4,212 eBooks in 2008 and 116,272 eBooks in 2012.

·         New Zealand public libraries report 2012/13 holdings of 111,336 (growth of 1,762% in two years), downloads of 354,066 (growth of 1,968% in two years) and expenditure of $1,038,543 NZ

[$900,868 US/€654,011] (growth of 363% in two years).

Canada

Five large urban public libraries in Canada with mature digital collections serving a combined population of

8,402,000 reported the following combined digital use statistics:

·         Downloadable eBook circulation in 2013 was 2,871,514 downloads or 0.34 per capita.

·         This is a 1,313.3% increase over 2010 downloads and a 60.9% increase over 2012 downloads.

·          139,023 downloadable eBook titles were in their collections (an increase of 526% over 2010) and 244,951 eBook “volumes”12 or 1.8 “volumes” per title.

·         In 2013 the average annual downloads per volume was 12.

·         The libraries provide access to 37,369 downloadable audio titles.

In Quebec, 71 public libraries belong to BIBLIOPRESTO.CA.13 Library users downloaded 661,598 eBooks in

2012/13 and it is projected that downloads will double in the next 12 months. Individual library data is indicative of strong growth in eBook availability and use:

·         Montreal Public Library downloads grew from 9,559 in 2012 to 31,708 in 2013 (+232%)

·         Quebec City Public Library downloads grew from 27,417 in 2012 to 69,951 in 2013 (+155%).

Europe

As is the case with the publishing sector, libraries in the European Union have been slower to adopt eBooks, especially in non-English speaking countries. eBook availability in EU libraries varies significantly from country to country depending upon factors such as the funding available for library purchasing, indigenous publishing practice, library governance structure and preferred licensing regimes. EU national initiatives are discussed by country in the next section of the paper.

View the complete study here

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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