The Section of Public Libraries has identified the revision of IFLA's Guidelines for Public Libraries as its major project in the Medium-Term Programme 1998-2001, as a logical sequence to the revision of the UNESCO Public Library Manifesto, completed in 1994. A working group of six members of the committee has been set up to carry out this daunting task and immediately recognized the importance of obtaining a range of views about what should be included in the revised document from public librarians from libraries at different stages of development and from different cultures.

To achieve this a pre-conference seminar, made possible by the support of UNESCO, was held at the Hotel Noordzee, Noordijk, Nethelands from 11-14 August, 1998 wiht the theme: "The Public Library as a Gateway to the Information Society". Tihere were 22 invited participants from 21 countries from all parts of the world. Speakers were drawn from among the delegates. Following an introduction to the seminar by Philip Gill (Chair, Section on Public Libraries), Ku Joo Be (Malaysia), Peter Klinec (Slovakia), Kay Raseroka (Botswana) and Gloria Rodriguez (Colombia), each gave a regional perspective on public library development in the area. Abdelaziz Abid (UNESCO) presented his organization's view of the future for public library, Barbara Clubb (Canada) outlined her experience in developing public library standards for Ontario, Kerstin Hassner (Sweden) spoke about the UNESCO Model Library Project (UNET) and Rob Bruijnzeels (Nethelands) gave his view of the Dutch experience of public library standards. There were also discussion groups in which participants were asked to comment on some of the fundamental question facing the working group, e.g., is it possible to draft a document which will be applicable worldwide; what should the objectives of such a document be; should it include standards or guidelines or perhaps both? The working group had developed a draft framework and comments on this were also invited.

The participants worked well together and at the end of seminar reached a number of conclusions which will form the basis of the revised document. This is a summary of the main ones.