1. Library in international connections

Librarians, an occupation to be found in almost all countries and regions, have formed communities to share their tasks transcending national s. Recently, in particular, such connections are getting more important than ever in tackling common issues that have arisen with the increase of digital information. In such circumstances, the National Diet Library (NDL) has been engaged in wide-ranging cooperative activities and almost its entire work seems to be connected to libraries abroad in some way or other. Here I would like to overview NDL's present and future international activities.

2. Cooperation with library associations and related institutions

It is important for the NDL to cooperate with international associations of libraries such as the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA). As the national library of Japan, the NDL joins the Conference of Directors of National Libraries (CDNL; established 1974), whose activities are closely related to IFLA, and its subsidiary the Conference of Directors of National Libraries of Asia and Oceania (CDNLAO; established 1979). The activities in specific areas will be described later in this article. As a parliamentary library, the NDL participates in the Library and Research Services for Parliaments Section of IFLA and the Association of Parliamentary Librarians of Asia and the Pacific (APLAP; established 1990).

The NDL's involvement in IFLA started in 1960 when it joined the IFLA international lending system. The NDL became an associate member in 1966 and a regular member in 1976. It first attended the annual conference in 1967, and has been sending representations to the conference every year since 1969. When the annual conference was held in Tokyo in 1986, the NDL assisted with its management. The NDL supports the IFLA's core activities by sharing the largest amount of expenses and by taking up the job of IFLA/PAC Regional Centre for Asia (for details, see 4). Furthermore, its staff members serve on the Section Standing Committees of the Libraries for Children and Young Adults Section and Bibliography Section, as well as working as corresponding members of the Library and Research Services for Parliaments Section and the Acquisition and Collection Development Section.

APLAP was established in 1990 with the aim of building up cooperation among parliamentary libraries in the Asian Pacific region to enhance their services for each parliament. This organization stemmed from the meeting of the Library and Research Services for Parliaments Section at the IFLA annual conference in 1988 which focused on the need for making a regional cross- cooperative organization of parliamentary libraries. The start-up conference was held in Seoul, and thereafter, the meetings have been held biennially. The NDL hosted the 6th conference in 2000, ten years after the foundation of APLAP.

3. Sharing information resources

(1) International exchange

Sharing information resources, including the effort to standardize bibliographic data for wider dissemination, is as always the most important feature of libraries' international cooperation. On the premise that if easier access to publications is ensured in each country it will improve international accessibility as well, IFLA advocated programs for better accessibility in such fields as acquisitions, bibliographic control, exchange, interlibrary loan, copying and library cooperation under the concept of Universal Availability of Publications (UAP; a programme to achieve worldwide availability and accessibility of all published materials. Closed in 2003), expecting national libraries to play a significant role.

To exchange materials with other countries is one of the conventional ways of cooperation, which can be traced back to the programs carried out by the Department of Foreign Affairs since the early stage of the Meiji Era and then was inherited by the Imperial Library. Today the NDL exchanges materials with 918 institutions in 154 countries and 3 regions and 38 international organizations based on nation-to-nation or institution-to-institution agreement, or in accordance with two conventions that Japan ratified in 1984 concerning the international exchange of publications stipulated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Although the NDL is investigating more up-to-date methods of exchange to meet the needs of today's world where digital information and its distribution on the Internet has been rapidly increasing, international exchange is still a effective means of collection development and cultural exchange through publications.

Additionally, the NDL is designated as a depository library of 16 international organizations including the United Nations. As such we have a responsibility to provide users in Japan with the publications of such institutions.

(2) Sharing bibliographic data

There is also a long history of cooperation in enhancement of distribution and sharing of bibliographic data including compilation and dissemination of standardized cataloging rules and classification tables. The methods of sharing have changed over time from the exchange of card catalog, book catalog, and database on magnetic tapes to the sharing of data on the Internet, which we are now working toward. Database exchange has been encouraged by the IFLA, which promoted universal bibliographic control and international MARC core activity (UBCIM) from 1974 to 2003 and published UNIMARC as an international standard format in 1997. In conformity with UNIMARC, the NDL started distributing JAPAN/MARC for monographs in 1981 and for serials in 1988. In 2001, JAPAN/MARC-UNIMARC version which fully corresponds with UNIMARC was completed.

In 2000, the NDL started providing access to a bibliographic database on the Internet under the name of Web-OPAC. Its functions were further improved and made available as "the NDL-OPAC (National Diet Library Online Public Access Catalog)" from 2002 when the NDL website was fully renovated concurrently with the opening of the Kansai-kan, and the English version was added at the end of September 2004. More than 13 million bibliographic data -- including that of 3.06 million Japanese books and 6.25 million data from the Japanese Periodicals Index -- can be searched from anywhere in the world.

The NDL also sends bibliographic information of books translated and published in Japan to the Index Translationum, an international bibliography of translated books, which has been compiled by UNESCO as part of its program to promote book distribution. 

(3) Japanese National Centre for ISSN

ISSN Network is an international cooperative organization that assigns an International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) to each serial publication so that publishers, vendors and libraries can gain and process accurate information on the hundreds of thousands of titles of serial publications issued in the world. The NDL has undertaken the job as the Japanese National Centre for ISSN since 1976 (the original name was Japanese National Center for the ISDS), which assigns ISSN to serials published in Japan and sends the data to the International Centre every month.

(4) International loan, copying and reference services

International loan, copying and reference services are now available to the public at large with easier procedures owing to the development of bibliographic databases and the Internet. In October 2002, the NDL started to accept online requests for interlibrary loan and copying from the NDL website (the services for individuals started in January 2003) and established a contact point for these services in the Kansai-kan. In addition, e-mail requests for international reference service started being accepted in October 2002.

(5) Sharing information resources on the Internet

The digital library provides anyone from anywhere with access to the information resources owned by a library. It is a completely new form of information sharing. The NDL website has continuously increased its content since 2002 when it was fully renovated and expanded its digital library services. The following are the examples of the contents available to people all over the world.

• NDL-OPAC
• Digital Library from the Meiji Era: Image database of the books published in the Meiji Era and held by the NDL 
• Rare Books Image Database
• Birth of the Japanese Constitution: A digital exhibition showing historic documents related to the making of the Japanese Constitution
• Web Archiving Project (WARP): An experimental project of the NDL to collect and preserve online information resources
• Database Navigation Service (Dnavi)

4. Preservation

International organizations including UNESCO, IFLA and the International Council on Archives (ICA), and the libraries and archives of each country alike are making efforts to preserve precious human cultural heritage and pass it on to future generations. In 1986, as one of its core activities, IFLA set up the PAC (preservation and conservation) programme. It consists of an International Centre that implements the global strategy and Regional Centres that manage activities in their respective regions (Note). The NDL commenced activities as the Asia Regional Centre in 1989, and based on the preservation cooperation programme drawn up in 1990, it has sent lecturers to conferences and training programs, provided training by request from national libraries in Asia, and has accepted Japanese trainees who engage in cooperative preservation activities abroad. Recently, it has implemented a 2-year cooperation plan starting from FY 2003 to support the Nepal National Library. In addition to technical support, we are now working out measures -- making guidelines for example-- to share know-how using the preservation techniques that NDL has accumulated. 

Note: The International Centre is hosted by the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris, which also works as a Regional Centre.

Other Regional Centres are as follows: National Library of China; Library for Foreign Literature (Russia); Biblioteca Nacional de Venezuela; Fundação Bibliteca Nacional de Brasil; Biblioteca Nacional de Chile; National Library and Information System Authority (Trinidad and Tobago); National Library of Australia; Library of Congress (USA); Preservation Unit, UCT Libraries, University of Cape Town (South Africa); and Bibliothèque nationale du Bénin.