Following the United Nations (UN) 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, IFLA launches a new TOOLKIT (now in 5 languages! English, Spanish, French, Chinese, Arabic) to support immediate advocacy for access to information in national development plans. Take action now so that Libraries have a say! 

In November 2015 IFLA launched a new TOOLKIT, which will help you to advocate to your national and regional policy makers to make sure that Libraries and Access to information are included as part of national and regional development plans that will contribute to meeting the global 2030 Agenda.

 Now that in September 2015 (during United Nations Sustainable Development Summit 2015) the UN endorsed the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (advocating the inclusion of access to information, safeguarding of cultural and natural heritage, universal literacy and access to Information for development and Communication Technologies: ICTs), it is up to ALL  Libraries and Institutions to act and ensure that their needs are reflected on their national level! 

IFLA encourages ALL library associations and institutions to take action now:

Libraries must now show that they can drive progress across the entire 2030 Agenda tackling the importance of access to ICTs, the need for greater access to broadband Internet in the community, and the need to support web literacy programs to ensure that EVERYONE is able to understand the information they find online.

As these plans are developed, the library community in each country will have a clear opportunity to communicate to their government leaders how libraries serve as cost-effective partners for advancing their development priorities. Advocacy is essential now to secure recognition for the role of libraries as engines of local development, and to ensure that libraries receive the resources needed to continue this work.

The TOOLKIT provides background on the issues and practical advice on how to set up meetings with government representatives. Template letters, talking points and examples of how libraries help meet development goals are included.

The toolkit will empower signatories (over 580 library and development organizations) of the Lyon Declaration  to continue to advocate for the inclusion of access to information, culture, literacy and access to ICTs within your national development plans.

The TOOLKIT is now available online in English, Spanish, French, Chinese, Arabic.

IFLA would like to once again urge you to take action now to ensure that Libraries and their issues are at the table when your national development plans are crafted.

 For more information, please see here.