Bibliotheca Alexandrina (BA) Resource Sharing is an online service provided, through African libraries, to African researchers. Through this service, BAIFA aims to provide access to the best of science, in order to fulfill the needs of the African research community and learning society, as well as establish a network of African libraries and enhance librarian’s services.

Resource Sharing Services

Submitting requests

Fees

Terms and conditions

BA Resource Sharing Services

The BA Resources Sharing gives BAIFA users access to:  

BA Serageldin Library

Less than 5% of the worlds’ literature comes from developing countries.  A primary reason for this is “Stataphobia” which is the fear of statistics and not having statistics books to refer to; 76% of articles that are turned down is due to poor research design. As a result, Dr Ronald Laporte, Professor Emeritus and former director of WHO Collaborating Centre, and Dr Ismail Serageldine, Founding Director Emeritus of Bibliotheca Alexandrina, decided to build the BA Serageldin Library, the largest virtual and book library in the world specifically dedicated to statistics and research methods. The collection includes over 4000 virtual materials available through the Research Methods Library of Alexandria and 12,000 statistics books donated by the world’s leading research experts.

Library of Congress’s electronic resources:

The Library of Congress is the largest library in the world, with millions of books, recordings, photographs, newspapers, maps and manuscripts in its collections. The Library of Congress’s Electronic Resources gives the user access to a wide range of: licensed and recommended free databases, indexing and abstracting services, and full-text reference resources; electronic versions of journals, newspapers and other publications; a selection of electronic books available within the Library of Congress’s subscription databases and other sources; and a selection of freely accessible web resources recommended by Library of Congress reference staff.

Submitting Resource Sharing requests

This is a free online service, available through African libraries, to African researchers affiliated with universities or research institutions and are BAIFA members. You can request a copy of a chapter in the statistics books’ collection or up to 5 articles from the Library of Congress’s electronic resources through the nearest library, and BAIFA team will send you the requested copy/ article in PDF format. To view the document, please use PDF reader software such as Adobe Acrobat Reader.

To submit a resource sharing request, you should follow the following steps:

For African Researchers

1. You have to be a researcher affiliated with an African university or research institution.
2. Join BAIFA network for free (a one-time registration is required): please click here to join BAIFA, and receive a free membership to the BA Serageldin Library (an e-card will be issued to you)
3. Read the terms and conditions of the service.
4. Search the BA Serageldin Library collection and make a note of the book title, author, ISBN and call number. If you are not sure which chapter will help you, you can ask the Research Methods’ help desk and expert statisticians will guide you and answer your questions about research design and statistics. Or, search the Library of Congress’s electronic resources and make a note of the article title, author, ISSN and link on the Library of Congress E-Resources Online Catalog
5. Go to the nearest library and ask the librarian to submit a free request for either a copy of a specific chapter or the table of contents (to explore the book chapters).

Resource sharing requests must be done through African libraries only, any requests sent by individuals will not be considered. If the librarian has not used this service before, please inform them to visit this page for information about the service.

6. Once we receive the request, we will send you an email with a link to download the PDF document. The link will be valid for one week and the expiry date will be mentioned in the email

You are not allowed to share or edit the requested book chapter in any form.

7. If you make use of the scanned book chapter in articles and books that you publish, please acknowledge the BA Serageldin Research Methods library for providing scientific materials for your work.

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For African Librarians

1. You have to be working in a library in Africa.
2. Join BAIFA network for free (a one-time registration is required): click here to join BAIFA, and receive a free membership to the BA Serageldin Library (an e-card will be issued to you).
3. When you receive a request for a book chapter from an African researcher, use the request form and complete the required details.
4. As soon as the request will be processed and the requested item will be sent to the researcher, we will email you confirmation that it has been sent.

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Fees

This service is provided free-of-charge to African researchers who are BAIFA members.

• Both requester and librarian must be BAIFA members before using this service.
• The request for an item is limited to one chapter of the book and not the whole book, or 5 articles from the Library of Congress’s electronic resources.
• The request for an item must be:
  • for study or research purposes only;
  • for teaching purposes in educational institutes;
  • not used for financial gain or other commercial purposes.
• The request is made for individual use, and not to be shared with anyone.
• The request of an item is made to provide a single copy at a time, or more if requested on different occasions.

BAIFA has the right to take the necessary measures and terminate the user’s membership if any of the terms and conditions are violated.