My article published in EALRGA Newsletter

Today, I found that my article "Collection Development in the Digital Age: Changing Roles of the National Library of China" is just published in EALRGA Newsletter (The newsletter of the East Asian Library Resources Group of Australia):

http://coombs.anu.edu.au/SpecialProj/NLA/EALRGA/newsletter1107/1107_gu.html

Chinese PM visisted national library

Today in the afternoon, Chinese Prime Minister WEN Jiabao visited National Library of China and participated in a reading salon there.

NLC Staff Congress Held Today

The Congress of Staff Representatives of National Library of China was held today. The representatives reviewed NLC's 2008 Annual Report and 2009 Annual Plan, 2008 Financial Report and 2009 Annual Budget, and the report for the bills submitted during 2008.

ISSN Directors' Meeting to be held in Beijing

Meeting of the Directors of ISSN National Centres will be held in National Library of China, Beijing, September 14-18, 2009, immediately after the centennial celebration of NLC.

Opening of NLC new building postponed

Due to various reasons, the opening (originally planned in July) of the new building (Phase II) of the National Library of China has been postponed to September 2008.

National Library of China to provide translation records to UNESCO

National Library of China has begun to submit bibliographic records to UNESCO for Index Translationum. Founded in 1932, Index Translationum contains about 1.7 million bibliographic records of translations from about 100 UNESCO member countries. Before 2008, Index Translationum contacted related organizations many times for Chinese records, but failed. In January 2008, I received a letter from Peter Lor, Secretary General of IFLA, concerning Index Translationum. I contacted the editor immediately and submitted 1,000 test records. By now, we have gone through all the procedures and begun to submit records on a regular basis. I hope users can search Chinese records in the database in the near future.

My visit to Bibliothèque nationale de France

I visited Paris during April 22-25. This is my first to Paris, even to Western Europe.

I visited Bibliothèque nationale de France (National Library of France), and had a short meeting with some of my IFLA colleagues (Françoise Leresche and Nadine Boddaert) and discussed some issues concerning the Anonymous classics: Chinese literature. The project should be completed before the IFLA general conference in Québec.

BnF is made of steel, glass and wood. I am very impressed by the buildings, the collections and the services of the library. Several hours of visit is not enough to see them all.

Mr. Cheng Pei was on his holiday. One of his colleagues, Mrs. Jie Formoso, discussed with me about the cataloging of Chinese monographs and showed me around the library.

Jan Fullerton giving lecture in NLC

Today, Jan Fullerton, Director-General of the National Library of Australia visited the National Library of China, and gave a lecture on the recent developments of the National Library of Australia. There are more than 100 people in the audience.

NLA is active and creative among national libraries in the world, and plays an important role in library-related standards and international cooperation activities.

Australian National Librarian to Visit NLC

Jan Fullerton, Director-General of the National Library of Australia, is going to visit the National Library of China on April 8, 2008. She will give a lecture on the management of NLA as the fourth lecture in the series "Forum of World Library Directors" of NLC.

When I worked in NLA in 1995, Jan was the Assistant Director-General of NLA. She visited NLC as an exchange librarian a couple of years ago, and talked with me several times. I met her also in Oslo in 2005 and in Durban in 2007.