Vol. 7 No. 1 (1982): NIgerbiblios: Vol.7(1),1982

EDITORIAL

January/April 1980 with the announcement that our journal has now become a professional one, we have noticed the tremendous interest shown as reflected in the contributions from colleagues all over the country. This is how things should be in a dynamic Director's situation where there has been a phenomenal growth in the number of libraries since the beginning of our Second Republic. Starting a library from scratch, as we all know, is a very rare opportunity which demands a lot of planning, hard work, initiative and drive. With the number of new Universities, Colleges of Technology, Polytechnics, and Colleges of Education being set up by both the Federal and State Governments in the last few months one would believe that our It gives me infinite pleasure to reopen this forum colleagues must have been having a lot of challenges which closed down in the dark days of the connected with building up their collections from Nigerbiblios when it struggled against odds for scratch, not to talk of the problems of recruiting staff survival. One of the first, and the most formidable, from a very lean market.

problems of this journal was the means of How have you been coping with such situations. We like to refer our colleagues to the contribution of Mr. B.U. Nwafor of the University of Jos which he production. Backlogs quickly grew to such a proportion that made any contributions on this forum meaningless because it didn't fit the times. The called "The problem of the Blank Cheque in National Library's manpower position at a certain Nigerbiblios (1-2) January/April 1980 pages 9-15 period was another contributory factor. These two That was from a university that had influential problems now appear to be behind us and our patrons parent in University of Ibadan. subscribers as well as contributors - can look We know that the majority of our new Universities,forward to a lively, informative and regular

Colleges of Education and Polytechnic libraries have Nigerbiblios. On the editorial bridge are competent

no foster parents as such, thus providing very fertile hands, now assigned to take charge of the grounds for uncommon experience. This is why we will very much like to hear from colleagues with such publications programme and activities of the challenging but very exciting experiences institution.It is pertinent to use this forum to disclose some anew feature we have just introduced with this aspects of the work of the National Library of Nigeria particular number is Conference Reports. We will like to have reports of Seminars, Workshops and as projected for the year 1982. As we operate the system all divisions present an evaluation of Conferences you have attended. It is all part of what achievements in the preceding year and a broad we want to disseminate. outline of areas for attention in the new year, with .We welcome back to this page our age-long indications of expected achievements. The overall column From the Director's Desk which was a focus to which all branches and departments must regular feature in past issues of our Nigerbiblios contribute and keep in view is effective service when it was a house journal of the National Library. This is the first contribution from our Director since we became a professional journal. This column will delivery. Our existing physical facilities are not yet with us fully on this, but the human factors will be fully motivated to rise above the temporary now share the same page with our comments in disabilities.

A great deal of attention therefore will beevery issue of this journal. It is our hope that you will expended on the service points at Yaba, Lagos, and in always find something interesting in what we have to the state branches. Say Service delivery in the national framework is also an With this first issue for 1982 we want to assure our objective for improvement. All the previous efforts in numerous readers that this journal will now appear the direction of resource sharing featuring regularly on schedule. We have done a lot of ground cooperative acquisition, interlending and work to make sure that we can keep our promise in information networks will be intensified. Our achievements and developments will be made this regard. This we know as we go along. The Nigerbiblios is your journal.

Editor