NSK hosts the team of an international project focusing on cross-border cooperation aimed at the preservation of European cultural heritage

From 9 to 11 September 2024, the National and University Library in Zagreb (NSK) hosted a meeting held as part of Cross-Border Collaboration for European Cultural Heritage Preservation and Sustainable Development of Library Services, an international project spotlighting the significance of libraries and their services in the context of the preservation of Europe’s cultural heritage.

Coordinated by the National Library of Bulgaria, the project was awarded the 2024 Erland Kolding Nielsen Grant from the Conference of European National Librarians (CENL) and focuses on the advancement of the professional and cultural exchange between the Bulgarian national library and NSK and on ensuring their long-term cooperation with regard to both libraries’ mission to contribute to the preservation of European cultural heritage.

Bulgarian and Croatian library forces coming together in preserving Europe’s cultural heritage

Apart from the Director of the National Library of Bulgaria Krasimira Aleksandrova, other meeting participants from the Bulgarian national library were the library’s Deputy Director Louisa Savcheva and Boyana Mincheva, Sevdiye Ali and Katerina Hapsali. The meeting participants representing NSK were the National Library Affairs Assistant to the NSK Director General Sofija Klarin Zadravec, Jagoda Ille, Karolina Holub, Renata Petrušić, Sanda Milošević, Tamara Štefanac and Karolina Tumbas.

They discussed the two libraries’ activities and analysed how they are currently responding to the need for the preservation of Europe’s overall cultural heritage and a sustainable development of library services. As part of the meeting’s programme, the Bulgarian national library’s staff made a tour of NSK, visited its Manuscripts and Old Books Collection and learned about NSK’s current activities on the digitisation of its holdings and their conservation from the staff of the NSK Preservation and Storage Department.

The project’s results and the examples of each library’s best practice in the context of the project will be promoted through LIS journals, as part of the upcoming meetings and conferences as well as on the pages and profiles of both libraries on social networks.