• 2014-01-03

To improve the integration and services of public library resources, National Central Library (NCL) has actively promoted its Public Library Resource Integration Development Project. According to the project, within four years regional resource centers will be established in northern, central, southern and eastern Taiwan, with eight more district resource centers to follow. These district centers will assist the regional centers in purchasing library resources and in guiding the expansion of resource exchange and sharing as well as reading promotion. This will lead to a more integrated use of public library holdings and a strengthening of their cultural and educational use.

With regard to the construction of these regional resource centers, NCL organized an oversight committee comprised of 13 scholars and experts in 2013. After reviewing applications from cities and counties throughout the island, the Ministry of Education assigned the Taipei Public Library as the northern regional resource center, Kaohsiung Public Library as the southern center, and Hualien County Cultural Affairs Bureau as the eastern center. The central center, as well as the eight district centers will be decided in 2014. 

To help regional resource centers build their collections, NCL commissioned experts to select outstanding books suitable for the general public in the following four categories: youth, knowledge, culture and creativity, multiculturalism. These lists, to be used by the centers in deciding which books to procure, were published in December 2013. They included Books for Youth (8,298 titles), Books of Knowledge (8,965 titles), Books on Culture and Creativity (8,761 titles), and Books on Multiculturalism (5,449 titles). Copies were given to all public libraries and school libraries (junior high and above) as resources to use in promoting reading and in purchasing quality books.