The Standing Conference Of Eastern, Central, And Southern African Library Associations (SCECSAL) XXIII 2018: Lessons Learned

Introduction

The XXIII Standing Conference of Eastern, Central and Southern African Library Associations (SCECSAL) 2018 was held at the Imperial Resort Beach Hotel in Entebbe, Uganda, from 23 to 27 April 2018, with the Uganda Library and Information Association and the National Library of Uganda playing the host. The XXIII SCECSAL had in attendance 220 participants from 15 countries/library associations that included Botswana, Ghana, Namibia, Malawi, Kenya, Uganda and so forth, delegates from outside the SCECSAL region such as Nigeria and Ghana and representatives from the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA). At the United Nations Sustainable Development Summit on 25 September 2015, more than 150 world leaders approved the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the agreement to promote sustainable development through the benchmark tagged Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) was signed. The theme of the XXIII SCECSAL therefore was “Positioning Library and information Services to Achieve Sustainable Development: Innovations and Partnerships”. SDGs are targeted towards putting an end to poverty, hunger and inequality, improving access to health and education and building strong institutions and partnership among others. In a nutshell, SDGs cover socio-economic issues. It spans across people and planet, promoting peace and international cooperation. Ubale and Yahaya (2016) note that the SDGs provide the link between local and international actions towards human-centered holistic development