The New Zealand Digital Library project is a research programme at The University of Waikato whose aim is to develop the underlying technology for digital libraries and make it available publicly so that others can use it to create their own collections.
Their web site provides several document collections, including historical documents, humanitarian and development information, computer science technical reports and bibliographies, literary works, and magazines.All are available over the Web, and can be accessed through searching and browsing interfaces provided by the Greenstone digital library software.
The Humanity Development Library is a large collection of practical information aimed at helping reduce poverty, increasing human potential, and providing a practical and useful education for all. This version, 2.0, contains 1,230 publications (books, reports, and magazines–in various areas of human development, from agricultural practice to economic policies, from water and sanitation to society and culture, from education to manufacturing, from disaster mitigation to micro-enterprises. It contains a total of 160,000 pages and 30,000 images, which if printed would weigh 340 kg and cost US$20,000. It is available on CD-ROM at US$6 for distribution in developing countries.
The objective of the Humanity Libraries Project is to provide all involved in development, well-being and basic needs with access to a complete library of around 3,000 multidisciplinary books containing practical knowhow and ideas. We invite many more development organizations to share their useful publications, to help distribute these libraries, and to participate in this humanitarian project.