Stay up to date with our latest developments, initiatives, and new resources!
As we enter 2024, we’re happy to share the latest edition of our regular forward look into key dates and events in the next few months for library advocacy. These are opportunities to get involved in wider conversations, and underline how essential libraries are for success across the full range of development goals. Take a look through, and think where you want and could be able to get involved!
In 2023, digital policy developments gained significant momentum. The development of AI and many other emerging technologies gave place to the acceleration of regulation in different areas that concern the library and information field. Because of this, we believe that 2024 will be a pivotal year for advocating in this area and making sure that the global voice of libraries remains strong.
Preparations for the United Nations' Summit of the Future are now well underway, with the possibilities to secure helpful decisions and references for libraries growing clearer. Find out more in our new brief, and get involved in shaping the key output document - the Pact for the Future!
Today we have issued a request for proposal for an author or authors to prepare a starting point report for the next IFLA Trend Report. The call is open for two weeks, until 8 December 2023.
Higher-level reading is training for analytical and critical thinking. As a signatory to this manifesto, IFLA joins the call to acknowledge the permanent significance of higher-level reading in the digital era.
Representatives of four different UN agencies met with over fifty librarians from across Sub-Saharan Africa at our mini-conference on how libraries can contribute to delivering the goals of the United Nations, identifying a wealth of opportunities for engagement. This event was made possible thanks to a grant from Stichting IFLA Global Libraries.
On 16-19 October, over 50 librarians from 32 Sub-Saharan African countries met in Nairobi, Kenya, to learn, share, and accelerate progress towards IFLA’s goal of strong and sustainable library fields at all levels. The meetings were made possible thanks to a grant from Stichting IFLA Global Libraries.
What opportunities are there between now and the end of the year to highlight and celebrate the work of libraries to decision-makers and partners? Our look ahead sets out some key moments at the international level, to help you in your planning!
Motivated by all you’ve heard and seen at WLIC about how libraries can engage in broader policy agendas? Here are ten ideas for concrete things that you can do to follow up. By doing so, you help advocate for libraries, build your own profile and connections, and hopefully also gain ideas and insights for yourself!
With a focus on the 2023 High Level Political Forum, IFLA has developed a range of materials that, we hope, will not only offer useful insights to colleagues around the world, but also tools that can help you in your advocacy.
In the last of our series, find out what IFLA's representatives at the 2023 High Level Political Forum are looking to achieve, for libraries and their users, nationally and globally.
To help you get to know the experience and perspectives of the librarians attending this year's High-Level Political Forum, we're sharing their answers to a short set of questions. In this article - the second of three - we find out what their message is to the wider development community around how libraries can contribute to achieving the SDGs.
For the first time, over half of the official reviews of national efforts to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as presented at the United Nations, refer to the contributions of libraries. This is a welcome recognition of the work of our field. This report explores and analyses these references, providing an advocacy tool for others in pushing for stronger recognition of and support for libraries in SDG delivery.
We are very happy to open the 2023 edition of the IFLA Regional Advocacy Priorities Survey, following on from the 1st edition in 2021. This asks associations, institutions and individuals around the world to share their priorities and needs when it comes to library advocacy. Deadline: 25 May 2023.
We're happy to share a high-level overview of key meetings, events and observances that provide opportunities for libraries to make our voices heard by governments and wider stakeholder groups. Take a look through, and think where you want and could be able to get involved!
In two events last week at the national and parliamentary libraries, IFLA was able to meet with a wide range of people in the Indonesian library community, both talking about the need to advocate for our profession and institutions, and hearing about great local experiences.
Librarians and archivists bring a unique set of skills and values which have a major positive impact on the organisations in which they work. However, we need to mobilise to ensure that those taking decisions understand this, as has been the case recently in Australia.
In the first of an occasional series focused on successful advocacy initiatives by libraries around the world, we look to Argentina, where a recent decision saw a commitment to funding community libraries for 50 years. To find out more about what was achieved, and how, we interviewed the Chair of IFLA's Regional Division Committee for Latin America and the Caribbean, Alejandro Santa.
The 2022 High Level Political Forum (HLPF) – the highlight of the annual calendar on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) – takes place this year on 5-18 July, and libraries will be well-represented.
At the heart of the work of IFLA and the library field as a whole around the SDGs is the fact that libraries are partners for development, across the policy agenda. As a result, it makes sense that libraries should also be involved in wider initiatives that look to deliver on development goals, at the national and international levels. We interviewed Merve Yavuzdemir from Turkey, who is running library projects with the United Nations Development Programme, to find out more, and to underline the possibilities for libraries everywhere to be proactive in taking a place at the table!