In the years after the Islamic Revolution the 200 thousand square meters of reading space in 1979 has increased to 1 million and 400 thousand square meters. Surprisingly, this increase does not include Tehran.

IBNA: This news was released this morning by Mohsen Khansari, the general manager of provincial libraries, in the meeting of the heads of Tehran public libraries and the responsibilities of library societies' secretariat.

In this meeting which was held in City Park library, he added: before the revolution we had 550 public libraries in Iran and now we have 2000.

Khansari mentioned that in the 5 years of Libraries organization activities as an independent institute we have had a growth in the quality and quantity of the libraries. He said: The libraries society has 7200 members throughout the country. According to the law the main decisions of public libraries should be made in the library societies and the general public libraries' offices are responsible for executing the decisions. In other words the decisions for each of the public libraries are made by the local managers which is a strong point.

He added: The Islamic republic of Iran is the 27 country in the world for scientific production and the 7th country in nuclear knowledge. The libraries are the support behind a country's knowledge and have the duty of promoting the reading and knowledge level of people.

He said: According to the statistics presented by the libraries organization last year, Iranians read 71 minutes everyday.

Khansari added: From every 100 Iranians only 4 are library members whereas in England 54 of every 100 people are library members.

He mentioned that the number of library members per capita is the least in Tehran and emphasized: Despite all the hardships and deficiencies, Tehran librarians should do their best to increase the number of library members.

He also asked for Tehran librarians to use the successful experiences of librarians of other cities: The libraries of Western Azerbaijan are the best in enhancing the electronic Information facilities and the libraries of Markazi province have many sideline programs for encouraging people to read.

Then Esfandiar Mobtaker Sarabi, the general manager of Tehran public libraries said that permanent improvement is dependent on culture. He also suggested that the success stories of each province's library plans be published in a booklet and be made available to all librarians.

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