1. INSTITUTIONAL REPOSITORIES IN GHANA presented by Helena Asamoah- Hassan, eIFL Coordinator – Ghana At the Workshop on Open Access and Institutional Repositories, Balme Library, University of Ghana 12 – 13 June 2007

2. INSTITUTIONAL REPOSITORIES IN GHANA - CHALLENGES Convincing management that it is necessary to have IR and so agree and plan to support it on long term basis. Convincing academics/researchers that it is worthwhile to put research results on Open Access. Marketing/Publicity among stakeholders- Administrators, Faculty/Researchers, IT Personnel, Librarians.

3. CHALLENGES …cont’d Having enough research results/information to populate the IR (content recruitment). Training of staff and authors to use the software and submit papers without difficulty. Interruptible electricity supply and low bandwidth.

4. CHALLENGES …cont’d Funding to start and to sustain the IR. Lack of enough competent, hard working and reliable staff on IR issues. Selection of software – Open Source or Proprietary and the type to choose from. Is it interoperable between repository system and other systems?

5. CHALLENGES …cont’d Amount/level/size of metadata to feature in the IR – varies by library & institution. Permissions for licencing and copyright issues.

6. INSTITUTIONAL REPOSITORIES IN GHANA SUGGESTIONS…. 1.Be knowledgeable about IRs first. 2. Plan a meeting with management of your institution to inform them about the benefits of IR to the institution so that policies can be formulated for the IR. 3.Make presentations at gathering of academics/ researchers featuring the benefits of an IR to them. Also use institutions journal/ newsletter/ magazine, publicity leaflet and word of mouth.

7. SUGGESTIONS …. 4.Champions among the academics/researchers to assist in convincing their colleagues to participate. Let them know they can still send their papers to referred journals & also put them on IRs. 5.Devise simple and easy means for authors to submit papers, and make trained staff available to assist when in difficulty.

8. SUGGESTIONS …. 6.Have high quality IT knowledgeable staff as well as staff well versed in existing library operations. 7.Have standby generators and also increase the bandwidth 8.Select interoperable software that can also be used by many institutions.

9. SUGGESTIONS.… 9.Have a uniform metadata system. 10.Obtain all necessary permissions and authority to host an author’s work in perpetuity.

10. End of Presentation Thank You