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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 45 | June 2000


Talking to our neighbours

Jan Fullerton with Murray McLean

Right: Jan Fullerton with Murray McLean, Australian High Commissioner, Singapore, at the reception

Australian librarians have always found the Congress of Southeast Asian Librarians to be an excellent venue for meeting colleagues from the region. CONSAL XI, with its theme of ‘Stepping into the New Millennium: Challenges for Library and Information Professionals’, held in Singapore from April 26–28, provided both the opportunity to obtain an update on the latest developments and to establish the directions for the region. Alan Bundy, Edward Lim, Fides Lawton, Vicki Williams, Sandra Oxley, Renata Osborne, George Miller and Kerri Smith were some of the large party of Australians attending.

Being in Singapore, this was clearly a high technology conference, both in its organisation and content. The papers were grouped around the topics of information resource and knowledge management, intellectual property rights and digital archives and document management.

Two National Library staff gave presentations: Margaret Phillips, Manager, Australian Electronic Unit, in her paper ‘Managing Chaos in the Cyberworld’ examined the chaotic aspects of the cyberworld, addressed the issues they raised and described library projects and initiatives which contributed to a more orderly and dynamic environment.

Colin Webb, Director, Preservation Services spoke on ‘The Role of Preservation and the Library of the Future’. He saw preservation in the future involving collaboration with a variety of groups involved with digital publications.

A pre-conference workshop called ‘Southeast Asian Librarians and Information Professionals: A Dialogue Meeting’ was generously organised and hosted on 25 April by Ch’ng Kim See, Head of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. Marie Sexton and Oliver Mann attended with Jan Fullerton.

Three major themes were discussed: preservation priorities, particularly the follow-on to the International Meeting on Microform Preservation and Conservation Practices in Southeast Asia held in Chiang-Mai, Northern Thailand, in February, periodical indexing related to the region and training needs. In these very useful discussions, it was agreed that there was a need for both cooperation and realism in any projects undertaken. During the week, an evening reception was co-hosted by the Library with the Australian High Commission and 80 delegates attended. Danielle Freeman and Oliver Mann had worked for some months to make it the success that it was.

Our trade stand at the Asian International Book Fair, held in conjunction with CONSAL, created interest as Library staff demonstrated a number of online systems including Kinetica and the Australian National Chinese, Japanese and Korean System.

As well, there was a wide variety of the Library’s publications on show. Kate Atkinson, Papiya Chakravarti and C.P. Tang worked very hard over the four days setting up the stand and talking to the many visitors.

Colin Webb, Sujin Butdisuwan & John Ben DeVette

Future developments of CONSAL will be of great interest to Australian librarians. The setting up of a Permanent CONSAL Secretariat by Singapore will provide a way of furthering the development of library services in the region.

Marie Sexton

Left: Colin Webb (left) with panel members, Sujin Butdisuwan, Director/Assistant Professor, Academic Resource Center, Mahasarakham University, Thailand and John Ben DeVette, Asia General Manager & Assistant Vice-President, EBSCO Information Services, Malaysia

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