FFHS-NEWS Local authority archive survey 2008

[News from the Federation of Family History Societies]

Results of the local authority archive survey 2008

 

According to the latest survey, co-ordinated by The National Archives, the
larger services are more likely to be high-performing than smaller ones.

The main challenges identified by the survey are:

*           Preserving digital records: no archive service yet has an active
digital preservation programme, though some promising developments have been
brought to light 

*           Cataloguing and access: most services still have large backlogs
of uncatalogued or inadequately catalogued material, which makes material
harder to access 

*           Buildings and facilities: many archive services need better
facilities to secure a sustainable future and quality of service provision 

Nevertheless, the survey also revealed some champions in the archive sector,
demonstrating the real value of these important institutions. The top five
were:

*           London Metropolitan Archives (88%) 

*           Norfolk (85.6%) 

*           Hampshire (84.5%) 

*           East Riding of Yorkshire (81%) joint with West Sussex (81%) 

*           Westminster (80.5%) 

Details of the survey results can be found at
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/news/stories/285.htm?WT.lp=n-33642

 

Roger Lewry

FFHS Archives Liaison

exec.member.rl at ffhs.org.uk

8 April 2009

 

 

The Federation of Family History Societies is a Company Limited by Guarantee

Company Number 2930189 (England & Wales) – Registered Charity Number 1038721

Registered Office: Artillery House, 15 Byrom Street, Manchester, England M3
4PF

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://ffhs-lists.org.uk/pipermail/ffhs-news_ffhs-lists.org.uk/attachments/20090408/27f1384f/attachment.html>