Ethiopia is located in Eastern Africa and lies between 3° and 18° N and 33° and 48° E in what is usually called The Horn of Africa. It borders Sudan to the North, North West and West; Kenya to the South; Somalia to the South East and East and the Djibouti Republic and the Red Sea to the East and North East.

The Country enjoys great geographical diversity ranging from high and rugged mountains, flat topped plateaus, deep gorges to river valleys and lowland plains. The vegetation is also as varied: ranging from desert, tropical forest, alpine shrub to grassland. Ethiopia has a greater diversity of climate, topography and soils than almost any other African Country.

This article will provide brief background information about the Afrika-Studiecentrum, its origins, aims, organisational structure and research activities, followed by a more detailed description of the library and documentation department The origins, contents, arrangement, coverage and distribution of the quarterly abstracts journal, Documentatieblad are explained, and are followed by a look at possibilities for European cooperation.

The Afrika-Studiecentrum began as the Leiden branch of the Rotterdam-based Afrika-Instituut, a commercially-oriented institute formally established in 1946 with the aim of promoting Dutch trade with Africa. In 1957 it split off from the parent institution and became an independent foundation, the present Afrika-Studiecentrum. Since then, it has grown from a relatively small documentation centre with a staff barely exceeding 10, to a relatively large interuniversity institute with a staff of around 40.

The first ever regional conference on library and information services’, to take place in south Africa, was held in Pretoria at the Human Resources Research Council Conference Centre (7,-8 May, 1992). The Conference, organised by Info Africa Nova, was attended by over 200 people from a cross-section of occupations. About 50 papers were presented by participants who were mainly drawn from the Anglophone SADCC zone, namely; Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa, including ‘Homelands’.

In attendance were information professionals, librarians, archivists, information officers and the like. Members of the teaching staff in library schools were well represented. Also present were researchers from other disciplines, peripheral to librarianship. Other participants included practitioners such as administrators from government departments and other individuals serving in various capacities in non-governmental organizations.

This article explains what has led to privatisation of some library services in Nigerian university libraries, with emphasis on the Ahmadu Bello University Library experience. It also discusses the prospects and problems of already privatised services such as photocopying and word processing. Other viable services for privatisation are enumerated.

This paper sets out a research agenda for the analytical study of the monopolisation of information and the implications for finance capital, by examining the processes and strategies that can be implemented to democratise information . through the use of information technologies such as compact disk read only memory, desk top publishing, scanners, modems and computers in order to collect African based information and knowledge in the form of databases that can be net-worked across the continent. The main idea is to develop Africa’s information capacity by building upon its existing socio-political, economic, cultural, scientific and technological base, in a manner that makes it possible for African knowledge to be developed further.