Governance and information literacy: pillars of sustainable development in Southern Africa

Paper Presented at a Colloquium on Information Literacy and Lifelong Learning, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 29 to 30 April, 2007 by Lawton HikwaGood governance is a basis for sustainable information literacy. Both good governance and information literacy are pillars of sustainable development. Progressive nations with modern economies recognise and advocate that information is a vital national resource. In fact, such economies are very much reliant on a reliable flow of quality information. To sustain development in Southern Africa, governments must be willing to enact legislation that forms the basis for policy frameworks for effective delivery of library and information services. In other words, these governments must and willingly, define expectations and verify performance levels of library and information services for the sustainable development of their individual and collective citizens. An information literate citizenry possesses the ability to know when there is a need for information, how to identify, locate, evaluate and use such information effectively in dealing with a problem or problems at hand (National Forum on Information Literacy, 2006). This paper discusses governance and information literacy as possible pillars of sustainable development in Southern Africa. It also recommends a template for the development of a library and information services policy framework that could be adopted by countries in Southern Africa