January 18, 1996 Library of Congress Resumes International Lending

The Library of Congress announced today that it will resume international lending on a limited basis beginning Feb. 1. On that date the Library's Loan Division will begin accepting on- line interlibrary loan requests from foreign libraries participating in lending systems administered by the two principal U.S. bibliographic networks: OCLC Inc. and the Research Libraries Group.

The Library of Congress suspended lending to non-U.S. libraries in 1993 as a result of severe budget cuts. During the intervening years, technological improvements in the lending process and reductions in overseas delivery charges have made it possible to resume lending to libraries that are equipped to take advantage of the new technology.

Libraries eligible to request loans from the Library of Congress include approximately 250 foreign institutions that are members either of OCLC using the interlibrary loan subsystem or the RLG ShaRes program using the RLIN interlibrary loan system. The Library is also evaluating the possibility of accepting loan requests from participants in the International Federation of Library Associations' interlending voucher scheme.

International lending is an important aspect of national library service that the Library of Congress is pleased to restore through special arrangments with OCLC and RLG.