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Unit 5: Resource Sharing and Networking

encouragement and permission from the top management an effort is made during 2001 Notes
to develop a practical agenda for the entire group of libraries to increase savings on these
accounts without any reduction in services to the customers.
A quick look at the data so gathered revealed that four major centre libraries (VSSC, SAC,
ISAC and SHAR) put together but independently spend about ` 482 lakhs on acquisition of
books, reports, journals, databases and other information material (Total budget of all libraries
of ISRO is over 600 lakhs). Journals each costing over $ 500 in four major libraries alone
consumes ` 255 lakhs. Further, ten ISRO libraries put together spend about ` 300 lakhs on 386
unique titles of costly journals with overlapping subscriptions to the extent of 52% (` 152
lakhs). In addition, the over lapping subscriptions to CDROM databases and costly standing
orders like that of AIAA and IEEE conference volumes consumed another ` 70 lakhs.
Meeting of Librarians
With the above data on hand, it was decided to have a meeting of four centre librarians to
decide on (i) elimination of duplication and to share costly resources wherever possible,
(ii) exchange of benefit of complementary/online access to journals to save on print
subscription (iii) opt for combined subscription on consortia price or combination
subscription price wherever available, and (iv) explore other ways of sharing costly
resources. Accordingly a meeting held on 14.9.2001 took note of the fact that resource
sharing and inter library cooperation has already been practiced by ISRO libraries among
themselves as well as with other libraries in the respective cities/ region. In order to
effectively face the budget crunch and increased prices of information materials and
conversion rates for hard currencies the need to gear up for more creative resource sharing
was felt. The two-fold purpose of the meeting was to increase the value of services to
customers and to save on the expenditure of ISRO libraries. A sort of cooperative acquisition
and/or consortia approach based on ABC analysis looked practical and useful as an initial
step. The meeting deliberated in greater detail and decided to take action as noted below
and also to resolve certain operational problems like payment, follow up, supply
destination, etc. Publishers/suppliers have to be requested to extend proportional benefit
to each participant library and receive payment from different libraries and to effect
supply directly to individual libraries.
Broad Areas of Collective Decisions
1. CD-ROM databases: ISRO libraries subscribe to CD-ROM databases. The concessional
prices for additional copies are substantial. It has been agreed to that ISAC library
will cancel subscription to Ulrich+, Aerospace and Compendex databases and depend
on VSSC library. In turn, VSSC library will cancel BIP+ and depend on ISAC library.
Further VSSC library will change subscription to Ulrich+ for alternate year basis.
The cancellations would save about $ 11,685 + Pound 2115 per year and availing
additional copy price would save another $ 1089 + Pound 3670 per year.
2. AIAA and IEEE conference volumes: As did for the year 2001, subscription for all
AIAA papers will be made for one print (for ISAC) and one set CDROM (for VSSC)
at $ 8000 per annum saving $ 3000 per year. The standing order procurement of
about 300 conference volumes of IEEE per year (POP +) as a package deal cost $
29,995 per year. However print plus online access costs only $ 40,990 resulting in a
saving of about $19,000 per year. It was decided to explore and opt for the
combination subscription by ISAC and VSSC libraries.

3. SRIM Reports: The overlapping subscriptions to 12 subcategories of SRIM (Selected
Research in Microfiche) were examined and decided to eliminate duplication thus
saving about ` 1.94 lakhs per year.
Contd....

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