Challenges in Automating Tanzania Academic Libraries

Abstract

The main aim of this paper is to establish the cultural challenges of automating academic libraries in Tanzania. It is evident that many libraries, especially in the developed countries are using automated libraries to retrieve data, hence save space, time and increase efficiency in their daily activities. While there are some automated libraries such as that of the University of Dar es salaam, majority are still operating manually. This paper starts with introducing the paper and defining academic library, automated library, and automated librarian and moves forward in identifying some eight cultural challenges that act as a stumbling block to the automation of Tanzanian libraries. Amongst those are poor reading culture, inadequate capital, availability of services, poor infrastructure, lack of ICT skills, lack of management support and the donor – funded dependency syndrome. It ends with a conclusion on how best to overcome these stumbling blocks.