KANAZAWA MUNICIPAL IZUMINO LIBRARY DESIGNATED UNITED NATIONS DEPOSITORY LIBRARY

Press Release
PI/936

KANAZAWA MUNICIPAL IZUMINO LIBRARY DESIGNATED UNITED NATIONS DEPOSITORY LIBRARY

The Kanazawa Municipal Izumino Library, in Kanazawa, Japan has been designated a United Nations depository library, making it part of an international network of 352 libraries in 142 countries that brings United Nations documents and publications to users around the world.

Kanazawa Municipal Izumino Library becomes the fourteenth depository library in Japan. Opened only last year, already nearly 250,000 visitors have used its services. More than 12,000 readers have used the special services available in the Foreign Affairs Information and Reference Room, where the United Nations collection will be housed and will be open to the public, especially to the eight junior colleges and seven universities in the Kanazawa area. Students, faculty, government officials and media representatives will be the main users of the United Nations collection.

The city of Kanazawa, founded more than 400 years ago, has the distinction of being known as an educational centre, home to 15 educational institutions with more than 31,800 students.

Since 1946, the Dag Hammarskjöld Library at United Nations Headquarters in New York, which is part of the Department of Public Information (DPI), has arranged for the distribution of United Nations documents and publications to users around the world through its depository library system. At present, 50 depository libraries in Africa, 96 in Asia and the Pacific, 29 in Eastern Europe, 82 in Western Europe, 44 in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 51 in North America receive these materials, with the understanding that their collections will be maintained in good working order and be available to the public free of charge.

United Nations Member States, as well as non-members, are entitled to one "free depository", usually the national library in the capital city. In addition, the national parliamentary library, if open to the public, is also entitled to receive material free of charge. Other depository libraries pay a token annual contribution to receive United Nations documentation. Developing countries pay a significantly smaller amount.

- 2 - Press Release PI/936 12 April 1996

The designation of depositories is carried out by the United Nations Publications Board, taking into account the views of the Government concerned. The degree of development of the requesting libraries and the overall geographic distribution of depository libraries in the countries concerned are among the criteria used.

United Nations professional librarians and information officers make periodic visits to the depository libraries to provide assistance and training in the management of the United Nations collection. In addition, special training seminars for depository librarians are periodically organized by the Dag Hammarskjöld Library, Department of Public Information, New York, and by the Library of the United Nations Office at Geneva.

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