Most of the issues that relate to information, publishing and libraries in contemporary Africa go back further than is generally realised. Summing up the proceedings of a conference on textbook provision and library development that took place in Manchester in 1991, an Overseas Development Administration spokesman said that ‘the obvious and immediate needs are to develop the skills of indigenous writers, build vibrant local publishing industries, and allocate more funds overall to providing textbooks and library books.’ Yet this is what one organisation - the East African Literature Bureau - had been attempting to do from its inception in 1948. Speaking at a Unesco seminar at Ibadan in 1953 the Bureau's director said its fields of activity included: ‘(a) textbooks for schools; (b) general literature and the tutoring of African authors; (c) the publication of a magazine; (d) the development of libraries; (e) the establishment of a business section with a publishing fund to develop the sale of the Bureau's publications and assist in the general development of bookselling.’

One of the biggest problems facing the new gèneration of scholars currently dealing with European imperialism is the lack of information in the West about the location and availability of archival sources in Africa. Although Gloria Westfall's recent survey has done much to rectify this situation for the former French possessions, more detailed work remains to be done on specific countries. This is particularly true of Cameroon, where much has changed in the twenty years since the last published description of the official archives appeared.

This paper summarizes the procedures necessary for entry into Cameroonian archives holding material relating to the colonial period, discusses the facilities available to researchers, and gives an overview of the physical condition and types of records held at each site. In particular, the holdings of the Buea and Yaoundè sections of the Archives Nationales, the archives of the Catholic church and those of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon are discussed.