World Intellectual Property Organization depository libraries program at QU

I spent my first day back in the office hanging my degrees and opening mail. Two months of business is pending but manageable. One large box greeted me and I opened it to see seven books on intellectual property from WIPO. One of the things I want to do this month back as the QU law librarian is organize our WIPO depository material. Qatar University Libraries are part of the World Intellectual Property Organization depository libraries program. Materials include many monographs, reports, periodicals, electronic documents on CD/DVD delivered up on regular basis (essentially every new WIPO publication).

This is a task I discovered late last year but was unable to find time to understand the requirements of the depository program or propose a process. Luckily, I have some experience in UN materials as I was part of a depository UN library at NSU law library for some years in Florida. I also know it is time consuming.

I discovered in my first searches that 31 WIPO depository libraries have been created in 20 countries. I started searching for examples of WIPO organization at other libraries. For example, the National Library of Belarus is another WIPO library and is storing documents in a reading room dedicated to international organizations. In another example, Azerbaijan State Economic University joined WIPO’s depository libraries in 2012 and created a WIPO Reference Center. Both are good models.

Loving FCIL.