NOTE: a version of this message was sent by the IFLA President on 13 December 2024 directly to all IFLA Members and affiliates, including directors and presidents of library associations. It was also sent to all IFLA volunteers.

Governing Board Update

I’m writing to you with an update on the Governing Board meeting that took place this week in The Hague. As highlighted in the post on IFLA’s website about the agenda, this is just the second in-person meeting we’ve had this year, and so a great opportunity to address some really important questions for our Federation, as well as to plan priorities for the rest of our term.

As in all of our meetings, our work strongly follows the six priorities I set out in my first speech as IFLA President in Rotterdam, in August 2024, and which we’ve been reporting against every month. You can read more about these on the IFLA President’s webpage.

During our discussions in The Hague, IFLA’s financial sustainability was high on the agenda. Our time together included a workshop exploring the potential of partnerships, looking both at the opportunities we have, but also what we need to look out for in order to maintain our focus on our core mission and values. We also discussed a sustainability strategy, including actions around building capacity to attract grant funding, building on what makes us unique (our volunteer and member community), consolidating and expanding membership, exploring the potential of events and services to contribute, and upholding good and efficient governance.

In the look ahead to our meetings this week, I mentioned the legal process in which we are engaged in with Stichting IFLA Global Libraries (SIGL), in order to achieve our goal of a stable and predictable basis for our cooperation going forward. The Board was updated on this, and further updates will be provided to the Federation as the matter progresses.

WLIC Review

Another key step was to receive the WLIC review . This represents a major commitment made in my first speech as President, and I am very grateful to our President-elect Leslie Weir, as well as the IFLA HQ team and all those involved in the steering group and working groups for making it happen.

I also thank everyone who took the time to respond to our surveys and take part in consultations – your inputs have really shown the way, and will be reflected in our next steps.

We’ll be sharing more in the new year about the review’s findings, and how they will be implemented. However, I can say that we have listened to the overwhelming majority who wanted to come together each year.

This means that we will be planning for a World Library and Information Congress (WLIC) in both 2026 and 2027. As a priority in the implementation of the review, we will be preparing a formal call for candidates for hosts, which you can expect to see in early 2025.

IFLA Elections 2025

We looked ahead to our elections in 2025, and celebrated the results of a successful pre-nominations phase. Significantly, this had seen a higher share of candidates come forward from traditionally less well represented regions (Asia-Oceania, Middle East and North Africa, and Sub-Saharan Africa) than the proportion already serving as IFLA volunteers.

In particular, we agreed on deadlines for IFLA members to have paid relevant membership fees, and so be eligible to nominate candidates (20 December 2024), as well as to be able to vote (to change the Sections to which they are registered (15 March 2025). See more in our elections timeline.

We also discussed the position of the IFLA Treasurer. This post was vacated by Jaap Naber last month, with Stuart Hamilton stepping in as acting Treasurer. We explored the options for filling the role between now and the end of our term, bearing in mind that our Statutes do not allow the Governing Board to co-opt members, the potential confusion created by running a new election process now, and above all the need for continuity and stability in how we manage our finances. The Board also sought advice from the IFLA Parliamentarian, Martyn Wade.

Consequently, the Board invited Stuart to continue in his role until the end of the term (August 2025), and I am happy to say that he has accepted.

Code of Conduct for IFLA Volunteers

Another major priority has been the development of a Code of conduct for IFLA volunteers. This has been another exemplary process, led by our Professional Council Chair Te Paea Paringatai and a group from across IFLA’s different bodies. This work is based on a deep exploration of similar codes elsewhere, as well as reflection on the needs of IFLA as an international federation.

The Board warmly welcomed this work, and thanked those involved, as well as proposing a number of small clarifications to make this as useful as possible. It has been clear from the beginning that this needs to be a living document that reflects the inputs and experiences of our volunteer community.

As a result, we will launch an interim Code for implementation in 2025 – something that volunteers should comply with, but where we will be closely monitoring how well things work, and what changes may be necessary. We will also have an implementation plan, developed by the working group that prepared the code, working with IFLA’s Parliamentarian, in order to structure these next steps.

I am very pleased to advise that our governance review will be launched in early 2025. There was strong interest from across the Governing Board in this project, with plenty of ideas already shared. The review will look both to evaluate the changes made in 2021, but also explore other changes that ensure that we can achieve our mission, in particular by providing the most effective structure possible for the global library field to come together. We’ll be discussing terms of reference for the review at our next meeting in February 2025.

In addition to reviewing overall updates on progress against our Strategy, we held valuable discussions with the chairs of our Advisory Committees on Freedom of Access to Information and Freedom of Expression (Jonathan Hernandez Perez), and Cultural Heritage (Helen Vincent). These discussions are a great opportunity for the Board to engage with key strategic issues, including the upcoming review of our Code of Ethics for Library Professionals, how we defend against efforts to suppress languages and cultures, and our response to disasters. I am grateful to Jonathan and Helen and their respective Advisory Committee members for their work and participation.

There was of course plenty more on the agenda – updates on planning for WLIC 2025 in Astana (as well as our General Assembly there), a welcome to the diverse range of new IFLA members since our last meeting, a review of final data on the Information Futures Summit, a review of our Vouchers Scheme and Library Map of the World, and a look at our representation on external committees.

AI and communities

In particular, I want to thank Erik Boekestijn, Peter Kok and all those involved in setting up the great event at LocHal, the award-winning public library in Tilburg, that allowed us to cross Dutch and international perspectives on AI. You can read more about this in the news story.

I am aware that this has been a long message, but before closing I do want to thank all of you for your ongoing support to IFLA. Through your membership fees, your time (and often both!), you are key to what makes IFLA such a strong Federation. As mentioned above, as we look at our sustainability as an organisation, we need to build on this strength, offering more opportunities and better structures for you to engage and help deliver on our shared goals.

Thank you, and to all of those who are celebrating in the coming weeks, a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

See you in 2025!

Vicki McDonald
IFLA President 2023-2025