Kyrgyz Libraries Community – Co-Operation for Development: New Challenges and New Approaches

“Kyrgyz Libraries Information Consortium”, one of the largest library associations in the country, celebrates its 10th anniversary. The Consortium was established in 2002 and through membership, it comprises more than 400 libraries within Kyrgyzstan, including the National Library, the State Patent and Technical Library, the Library of the Academy of Science, and many other academic and regional libraries. The Consortium’s creation was an answer to the challenges the country faced: lack of information, very low level of technological development, no budget for collection development, lack of cooperation and collaboration between libraries in the country as well as with the international library community. The history and development of the Consortium, the Consortium mission, its goals, its main initiatives and the strategic directions to be taken are presented in the article. The importance of library development and how libraries in developed countries established strong and effective organizations are reviewed and analyzed here. This paper also presents the challenges and approaches that must be taken for future development of libraries in Kyrgyzstan.