National Library of Jamaica's holdings to be placed on Worldcat

Author: Minister, the Hon. Lisa Hanna, Ministry of Youth & Culture
Title: Contribution to the 2014/2015 Sectoral Debate
Date published: May 20, 2014
Source: Jamaica Information Service (JIS):
URL:  http://jis.gov.jm/media/hanna-sectoral1.pdf
 

Abstract:

The Hon. Lisa Hanna, the Minister responsible for the portfolio of the Ministry of Youth & Culture, announces a number of events and plans for the National Library of Jamaica (NLJ). Among the events mentioned are:

• the NLJ's 2014 Distinguished Lecture to be presented by novelist, poet and Panama historian Miss Olive Senior to mark the Centenary of the Panama Canal and its impact and influence on the construction of Jamaica's economy and culture.
• The award of Poet Laureate to Professor Mervyn Morris

Also mentioned in her speech to Parliament are the plans afoot to:

• outsource the NLJ's catalogue to OCLC's Worldcat Local 
• the launch of a digitized encyclopaedia of Jamaica for local and global references
• and the digitization of  legacy 16 millimetre film resources for dissemination through social media

Excerpt:

The National Library in an effort to maximise use of its resources will implement an alternative to the current library management system, which though very low in cost is the most effective at showcasing the NLJ resources locally and globally. The new system Worldcat Local will place the catalogue of the library's holdings into a global library catalogue that is discoverable through popular search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing. In a real way this new system will truly enable Jamaica to the World. 

In addition, in recognition of the public's preferred mode of accessing information we launched the National Library of Jamaica Digital Collection. NLJDigital will create a digitized encyclopaedia of Jamaica for local and global references. This digital encyclopaedia includes material from the library's paper and photograph collection as well as the full text of18th and 19th century Jamaican books already digitised by Google.

In a further move to preserve the nation's intellectual output, this year we will be transferring the legacy 16 millimetre film resources to digital and the concomitant dissemination of these resources through programming and social media.