Ministry of Culture Republic of Croatia NAPLE Conference Athens, 13 May 2014

Public library service provision in the Republic of Croatia O Provision of libriary services to the community is of particular social interest to the Republic of Croatia. Despite of difficulties in funding, significant budget cuts, lack of a unified national system, public libraries have always sucessfully fulfilled their cultural, information, educational and social role in the Croatian society. O Unprecedented technological, organizational and cultural changes and the need to support the evolving needs of users, staff and collections in an adverse economic environment have spurred the libraries and the competent state authorities to develop and implement a National Library Strategy, allowing amendment of current legal framework, library policies and infrastructure.

Croatian Library Council The Croatian Library Council is an expert and advisory body of the Ministry of Culture entrusted, among else, with the task to re-envisage library policies, re-purpose the provision of library services and implement transformative changes in library networks: O Analysis of the current status of librarianship in the Republic of Croatia; development and implementation of new core and supporting dierections O Promoting the adoption of and proposing amendments to current legislation governing library policies and services O Proposing and implementing measures for improving the Croatian library system O Promoting lifelong training of librarians

Act on Libraries O Adopted in 1997 O Amendments to the Act in 2000 and 2009 O A large number of provisions of the Act are not aligned with laws and bylaws directly related to the provision of library services O Needs to be modernised, upgraded and amended

O Appointment of Task Forces in charge of implementing key strategi objectives: 1. National Library Strategy2013 – Amendment of legal framwork (Act on Libraries, bylaws, rules, codes) 3. Drafting the Ordinance on professional positions and career advancement in the library profession 4. Legal deposit O Participation in the development of the Croatian Heritage Digitization Strategy O Development of the National Written Heritage Protection Programme O Development of the National Monastery Library Reconstruction Programme Croatian Library Council 2013 – 2017 Action Plan

Croatian National Library Strategy Strategic objectives: O Functional networking of all kinds of libraries into a unique Croatian system which is to ensure complete coverage of population by library services (currently 70 %) O E- content management O Library as the third space –central cultural and information centre of the community

Croatian National Library Strategy O Key measures: 1. Introduce innovative library services 2. Build a creative, sustainable and efficient organization that supports the implemenation of a single national library information system 3. Develop a nation-wide IT infrastructure, providing full compatibility of library services 4. Define and develop a competence framework that fosters career development and professional growth of library staff, resulting in continuous improvement in the quality of service provision

Thank you for your attention! Directorate for Literature, Publishing and Libraries Department for Libraries Dubravka Đurić Nemec, director Phone: