Page 118 - DLIS003_LIBRARY ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT

Unit 6: Library Finance

Notes
notes that libraries of all kinds need money. The amount of funding that a library receives
directly influences the quality of its services. While the majority of funds for libraries
come from state and local sources, federal funding provides critical assistance, giving
libraries across the country the financial support they need to serve their communities.

Like water and air, libraries have become an integral part of human existence. Often called
the memory of human race, libraries are supposed to have on their shelves the records of
almost everything which man has thought, dreamt of and invented. All these demand
that, academic libraries should be adequately funded to be able to carry out these functions
(Ifidon, 1992).
Libraries are organic. This is to say that they grow or shrink with time depending on how
much life is infused into them. Fund is needed to provide the information needs of the
academic library. The academic library is a social service organization that is capital
intensive. Money is needed for building, physical facilities, books, journals, electronic
resources, personnel, etc. (Ehigiator, 1997).

The library is invariably a part of a wider organization – an arm of government, university,
school, and research institute or business concern as the case may be. Its budget therefore
is negotiated with its parent organization. The parent body is therefore the proprietor that
takes full responsibility for its funding. Academic libraries are financed from the budgets
of their parent institutions. These funds usually cover only the current expenditure. But
sometimes, libraries are supported by government ministries particularly Ministry of
Education (Akporhonor, 2005).
According to Emojorho (2004), Nigerian government owned university libraries derive
funds from government allocations, endowment funds, library fees, gifts and other
miscellaneous sources such as the sale of duplicate materials, fines and photocopying; that
the bursar integrates and collates the various estimates from the various departments. The
estimates are then channelled through and defended, at the following six levels:
1. Library committee: the librarian presents and explains his budget estimate.

2. Development and Estimate committee, the librarian defends his budget estimate.
3. Finance and general purposes committee.
4. The university council.
5. The National University commission/commission of higher Education.

6. Ministry of finance and education Development- through the ministry of education.
In academic libraries, the budgetary procedure starts with the bursar who sends out a
notice to the librarian asking for preliminary budgets estimates. When the librarian receives
this notice, he and the various sectional heads of the library meet and draw up the budget
estimate which is then sent to the bursar. Funds for library and information services are
traditionally derived from the library’s proprietor. The extent of such revenue varies
from fixed fraction of received grant to ad-hoc arrangement (Edoka, 1992).
Hisle (2002) pointed out that: academic libraries in developing countries depend mainly
on government funding and they do not show any interest or experience in well-organized
fundraising for several reasons:
1. Citizens used to give donations to other types of libraries, mainly public libraries.
2. Lack of flexible administrative systems.

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