CRI听力:One Library Card, Shared Book Resources

Beijing residents now need only a single library card to browse books and digital materials in 63 public libraries since the Capital Library Alliance was formed on March 12.

Books borrowed from one library can be returned to another, and administrators are addressing the technical issues so that readers will be able to borrow books of the National Library from municipal public libraries or vice versa.

The service will gradually be expanded to other alliance members such as university libraries and libraries belonging to research institutions, hospitals and schools.

Deng Juying, Assistant Curator of the Capital Library, says there are abundant library resources in Beijing, but they could not be easily shared due to different administrative systems. The Capital Library Alliance was formed to solve this problem.

"The library alliance offers a platform to effectively integrate the library resources in Beijing and take full advantage of different library resources with different systems. The alliance members can share information and resources, so it better benefits readers."

Zhao Xinping is a lawyer who lives in east Beijing's Tongzhou district. Because she cannot always get the books and materials she needs from Tongzhou libraries, she often spends a lot of time borrowing books from and returning them to the Capital Library.

Zhao praises the new library alliance because of the convenience it offers readers. She says she expects to have more opportunities to access to academic materials in university libraries.

"If I can use my library card to borrow academic materials from universities such as Peking University and Tsinghua University or even some foreign academic resources, I would rather pay a higher deposit. It would be even better if I could borrow and return them from a library near my home."

Zhao's wish is exactly one of the highlights of the library alliance, which is making efforts to open university libraries to the public.

Zhu Qiang, Peking University's librarian, says university libraries can meet the temporary requirements of the public for academic resources in certain areas while first satisfying the demands of their own teachers and students.

"Public libraries usually collect many common materials, but they may not meet the study requirements of readers. However, university libraries, where most collections are academic materials for study and research, can well satisfy these readers."

The Peking University Library is not offering book-borrowing services to the public yet. Readers can only apply for a temporary reading card to search for materials inside the library and make photocopies.

Zhu suggests that university libraries create a collection of copies of academic materials to benefit more readers. He says the alliance members must still discuss detailed measures to open university libraries to the public.

The capital library alliance plans to introduce other measures to benefit readers, including a website with alliance information, co-sponsored lectures and an annual book flea market for citizens. It also will explain how readers can use the libraries' resources during "Readers' Week" in the first week of September.

For CRI, I'm HF.