Indonesia digital library: Dreams and reality

By Rosa Widyawan

JAKARTA (JP): Digital libraries might make research easier for scholars, as well as easing the budgetary pressures on libraries. They might solve our intellectual heritage preservation problems, or they might help libraries extend their collections to include new media. But perhaps their most important advantage would be their ability to help society, to make information more available, improve its quality and increase its diversity.

In some developed countries, there are libraries (e.g. in some pharmaceutical companies) which already spend more than half their acquisition budgets on electronic resources, rather than paper. Meanwhile, many university libraries are finding it impossible to maintain their traditional collection practices within the constraints of their institutional budgets. As a result they are looking eagerly to the new technology as a solution.

The Central Library of the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB Central Library) recently initiated the Indonesia Digital Library Network, in cooperation with the Computer Network Research Group and the Knowledge Management Research Group. This project is aimed at improving graduate education and increasing the sharing of information among education and research institutions through the development of a national digital library of final projects, theses, dissertations, research reports and expertise directories.

The Mellon Foundation has done studies showing that between 1970 and 2000 the typical U.S. academic research library will lose nearly all of its purchasing power. Increases in journal and monograph prices, currency shifts and increases in the number of publications are all making it harder for libraries to afford their previous level of purchases.

Nearly every university is reviewing its subscriptions and canceling journals. In Indonesia, the situation is worse. Libraries cannot afford to subscribe to international publications. This is not only the result of dramatically shrinking acquisition budgets, but also due to the fluctuation of the rupiah against the dollar. It is not surprising that a big research library like PDII-LIPI now only subscribes to five journals, compared to the 1,000 core international journals it subscribed to in 1997.

Since much of the cost of printing many scholarly journals is prepress, a loss of subscriptions means that the cost to the remaining subscribers must be increased. This will cause more price increases. The solution probably is to publish them on CD- ROM, a technology with huge economies of scale and low costs, with production being in the range of $2. This situation has inspired some libraries in Indonesia to publish their catalogs and secondary literatures on CD-ROM. Of course, this makes it easier to disseminate the information all over the archipelago.

In addition to problems buying materials, libraries are beset by increasing costs for buildings and storage, and with a steadily growing problem of paper books which are deteriorating and in need of treatment.

Using the technology

In the U.S., over 100 million books are brittle, and there is as yet no suitable solution, although there are expensive photocopying and deacidification methods, as well as microfilming. Some fine and rare books in Indonesia are endangered due to humidity and pollution. This has led the National Library to carry out a project to digitalize their rare collection, and this ongoing project is supported by some related institutions.

Although the advantages of digital libraries are their ability to help society, to make information more available, improve its quality and increase its diversity, there are few institutions here supporting this idea. This might derive from a lack of awareness among decisionmakers on the importance of sharing information, and also preserving intellectual heritage. The Digital Library Network project being carried out by ITB has not had an enthusiastic response by other libraries, only a few of which intend to join the network.

In general, the utilization of information technology in Indonesian universities is relatively low compared to their counterparts in developed countries. There are around 35 universities here that have their own homepages. These homepages carry company profiles, academic agendas, publications or enrollment. Of the 35 university homepages, only Diponegoro University publishes an electronic journal.

University libraries in Indonesia are pioneers in providing their catalogs over the web, although there are only seven universities which provide access to their Online Public Accessed Catalog.

Most universities use their websites as promotional leaflets, for enrollment, chatting or bulletin boards with (excuse me) no relationship to academic matters. It seems there is the belief only a prestigious institution can have a good website. People are competing to put their company profiles on the web, but they do not have any interesting matter, such as a database. Often, people build links without considering the needs of their clientele.

On the other hand, special and research libraries have made no significant developments in building their digital libraries. Also, there is still no standardization of offering catalogs on the web. It seems they should be looking back to the philosophy of cataloging.

When clients find information on the web and place an order, document delivery is still a major obstacle. Generally, library clientele find difficulties in using electronic document delivery because of the frustrating and expensive telecommunications infrastructure. The best solution is waiting two weeks for snail mail.

Indonesians are enthusiastic in using this new information technology, seen by the significant increase in requests for computerized cataloging, electronic publishing, webliography, etc. But this will not be of much use without the support of policymakers.

For an underdeveloped Indonesia, which is still facing difficulties in prosecuting corrupt bureaucrats and enforcing the law, digital libraries are an expensive investment. People have to explore the advantages of Internet technology for the welfare of everyone. Otherwise it will be like rowing a luxurious glass canoe across a dangerous and wild ocean.

The writer is a librarian at PDII-LIPI, Jakarta. She can be reached at rosa widyawan@hotmail.com.