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Ch Muhammad Nadeem Akhtar

Senior Librarian Ayub Agriculture Research Institute

• Experience:

  12+

Case Study: Ayub Agricultural Research Institute In-House Digital Library (The Largest In-House Digital Library of Pakistan in Agriculture Sector)  

Ch. Muhammad Nadeem Akhtar

Senior Librarian | Web Administrator

Ayub Agricultural Research Institute (AARI), Faisalabad

Government of the Punjab, Pakistan

E-mail: ch.nadeem@aari.punjab.gov.pk

Muhammad Owais

Assistant Research Officer

Wheat Research Institute, AARI, Faisalabad

E-mail: mowais928@gmail.com

  Abstract In-House Digital Libraries (IDLs) have been recognized one of the most effectively disseminating and preserving hubs for scholarly research publications and the successful and smooth running of these IDLs is dependent on the successive contributions of researchers. AARI In-House Digital Library collection contains more than two hundred thousand documents (original created and digitized forms) like Institutional rare books, reports, crop production technologies, agriculture research related books, laboratory manuals and historical records. This paper describes how AARI In-House digital library has evolved to meet the updated knowledge needs of agriculture scientists/ researchers for their professional development and it ensures that discipline-wise collections are developed accordingly. IDL at AARI has brought manifold ease for agriculture research community, especially to the AARI associated institutions throughout the Punjab province, to get access and retrieve the resources. The IDL collection is being maintained and browsed by using open source Calibre: e-book management software and it has been serving to about more than one thousand agriculture scientists belonging to nearly 200 research institutes/stations and sub-stations since 2011. Keywords: AARI In-House Digital Library, Open Access, Agriculture Scientists/Researchers,  Calibre.