Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions -  i2010 :  digital libraries {SEC(2005) 1194} {SEC(2005) 1195}
Date: 2005-09-30
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: EU programme, access to information, digital technology, heritage protection, information service, virtual library

COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES 

Brussels, 30.9.2005 
COM(2005) 465 final 

COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

i2010: DIGITAL LIBRARIES 

{SEC(2005) 1194} 

{SEC(2005) 1195} 

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Table of Contents 

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

5. 

6. 

7. 

7.1. 

7.2. 

8. 

Introduction .................................................................................................................. 3 

i2010: digital libraries .................................................................................................. 3 

Online availability of Europe’s cultural heritage: what is at stake?............................. 4 

Digitisation................................................................................................................... 5 

Online accessibility ...................................................................................................... 6 

Preserving digital content............................................................................................. 7 

The European response ................................................................................................ 8 

Initiatives under way .................................................................................................... 8 

New or reinforced initiatives........................................................................................ 9 

Conclusion.................................................................................................................. 11 

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COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

i2010: DIGITAL LIBRARIES 

1. 

INTRODUCTION 

In a letter of 28 April 2005 to the Presidency of Council and to the Commission, six Heads of 
State and Government advocated the creation of a virtual European library, aiming to make 
Europe’s cultural and scientific record accessible for all. The Commission has welcomed this 
plan and will contribute to it through the i2010 flagship initiative on digital libraries. 

The present Communication outlines the vision underlying the digital libraries initiative and 
presents  its  main  building  blocks.  At  the  same  time  it  constitutes  the  first  element  of  the 
initiative,  dealing  with  the  digitisation,  online  accessibility  and  digital  preservation  of  our 
cultural heritage. The Communication analyses the challenges for bringing out its full cultural 
and economic potential and proposes a first set of actions which will contribute to overcoming 
the present fragmentation of efforts in Europe. 

2. 

I2010: DIGITAL LIBRARIES 

The  digital  libraries  initiative  aims  at  making  European  information  resources  easier  and 
more  interesting  to  use  in  an  online  environment.  It  builds  on  Europe’s  rich  heritage 
combining multicultural and multilingual environments with technological advances and new 
business models. 

Digital libraries are organised collections of digital content made available to the public. They 
can  consist  of  material  that  has  been  digitised,  such  as  digital  copies  of  books  and  other 
‘physical’  material  from  libraries  and  archives.  Alternatively,  they  can  be  based  on 
information originally produced in digital format. This is increasingly the case in the area of 
scientific information, where digital publications and enormous quantities of information are 
stored in digital repositories. Both aspects – digitised and born digital material – are covered 
by this initiative. 

Three  main  strands  will  be  followed  to  realise  the  potential  of  digital  technologies  for 
widespread and easy access to information: 

•  Online accessibility, a precondition for maximising the benefits that citizens, researchers 

and companies can draw from the information. 

•  Digitisation of analogue collections for their wider use in the information society. 

•  Preservation and storage to ensure that future generations can access the digital material 

and to prevent precious content being lost. 

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The digital libraries initiative will address these strands in several building blocks. Whereas 
the  present  Communication  deals  with  Europe’s  cultural  heritage,  a  second  key  area  is 
scientific information. This is an area with its own specificities and dynamics in view of the 
need to handle and store huge quantities of digital data, and the rapid growth of publications 
only available in digital form. A Communication foreseen for 2006 will set out the specific 
challenges for digital libraries in this area, including the role of the supporting high capacity 
infrastructure and the actions to be undertaken at European level. 

An online consultation accompanying the present document will deal with some of the major 
challenges influencing digitisation, online accessibility and digital preservation. Replies will 
be an important input for a possible Recommendation on digitisation and digital preservation. 
The replies will also feed into other relevant Community initiatives such as the review of the 
copyright framework. 

In summary: 

The  present  Communication  ‘i2010:  digital  libraries’  with  a  focus  on  cultural 
heritage (2005) 

An  online  consultation  (2005)  on  questions  related  to  digitisation,  online 
accessibility  and  digital  preservation.  Replies  will  feed  into  a  proposal  for  a 
Recommendation on digitisation and digital preservation (2006) and other relevant 
Community initiatives such as the review of the copyright framework (2006) 

A  Communication  on  the  accessibility  of  scientific  information,  focusing  in 
particular on the issue of born digital information (2006)  

3. 

ONLINE AVAILABILITY OF EUROPE’S CULTURAL HERITAGE: WHAT IS AT STAKE? 

Cultural and social aspects 

European libraries and archives1 contain a wealth of material – including books, newspapers, 
films, photographs and maps – representing the richness of Europe’s history, and its cultural 
and  linguistic  diversity.  The  online  presence  of  this  material  from  different  cultures  and  in 
different languages will make it easier for citizens to appreciate their own culture heritage as 
well as the heritage of other European countries, and use it for study, work or leisure. It will 
thus  contribute  to  complement  and  support  the  objectives  of  European  Union  action  in  the 
field of culture. 

Economic aspects 

Libraries and archives are major sectors of activity in terms of investments and employment. 
In 2001 European libraries employed 336,673 full time equivalent staff with more than 138 
million registered users.2 Their impact on the economy at large is substantial.  

1 
2 

Many of the issues raised are also relevant for museums presenting their collections online. 
International library statistics: Trends and Commentary based on the Libecon data, D. Fuegi and M. 
Jennings, 2004. 

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Digitisation  of  their  resources  could  considerably  increase  this  impact.  Once  digitised, 
Europe’s cultural heritage can be a driver of networked traffic. It will be a rich source of raw 
material  to  be  re-used  for  added-value  services  and  products  in  sectors  such  as  tourism  and 
education. If properly preserved, the material can be used time and time again. Furthermore, 
digitisation efforts will have considerable spin-offs for firms developing new technologies. 

4. 

DIGITISATION 

The quantity and diversity of material in Europe’s libraries and archives is impressive.  

The  total  number  of  books  and  bound  periodicals  (volumes)  in  European  libraries 
(EU 25) was 2,533,893,879 in 2001.3 

The  main  reason  for  digitising  this  material  is  to  make  it  available  to  users  in  an  online 
environment. In some cases, however, digitisation is not primarily used to make content more 
accessible, but to guarantee its survival. This concerns in the first place audiovisual material, 
where analogue formats deteriorate with time, and precious material is lost.  

A  survey  of  ten  major  broadcasting  archives  found  1  million  hours  of  film,  1.6 
million  hours  of  video  recordings  and  2  million  hours  of  audio  recordings.  Total 
European holdings of broadcast material are probably 50 times larger. Most of the 
material  is  original  and  analogue.  70%  of  the  material  is  at  risk,  because  it  is 
decaying,  fragile  or  on  obsolete  media.  Every  year  Europe’s  audiovisual  archives 
lose 10,000s of hours of the oldest part of their collections.4 

At present, only a small part of European collections has been digitised. Digitisation activities 
exist  in  all  the  Member  States,  but  efforts  are  fragmented  and  progress  has  been  relatively 
slow. This was underlined by the announcement of the Google initiative to digitise 15 million 
books  from  four  major  libraries  in  the  US  and  one  in  Europe.  If  realised  as  planned,  the 
Google initiative by far exceeds the efforts at national level in any of the Member States. Also 
in other parts of the world digitisation efforts are being stepped up. In India and China there 
are,  for  example,  ambitious  digitisation  agendas  in  place  covering  material  in  different 
languages. 

A number of challenges impact the pace and efficiency of digitisation in Europe. 

Financial  challenges:  Digitisation  is  labour-intensive  and  costly.  It  takes  a  considerable 
upfront investment, which in most cases goes beyond the means of the institutions holding the 
information.  Digitising  all  relevant  material  would  represent  an  impossible  task,  so  choices 
have to be made on what is to be digitised and when. 

Organisational  challenges:  A  ‘digitise  once,  distribute  widely’  strategy  can  benefit  all  the 
organisations involved. Duplication of effort - digitising the same works or collections several 
times  -  must  be  avoided.  This  can  only  be  achieved  by  a  sustained  co-ordination  effort  at 
national  and  European  level.  The  latter  can  also  enhance  European  added-value,  where  the 
final result is more than the sum of the parts.  

3 
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Ibid. 
Survey by the IST Presto project which ended in October 2002. http://presto.joanneum.ac.at/index.asp 

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New  ways  of  working  are  necessary  to  make  digitisation  happen.  Partnerships  with  or 
sponsoring by the private sector could contribute, but this type of partnership is not yet well 
developed.  Furthermore,  investments  in  digitisation  must  be  accompanied  by  organisational 
changes within the institutions concerned, including upgrading the skills of the staff involved. 

Technical  challenges:  A  key  technical  challenge  is  the  need  to  improve  digitisation 
techniques  in  order  to  make  digitisation  -  for  audiovisual  material  as  well  as  books  -  more 
cost-efficient  and  affordable.  For  digitising  written  texts  improved  automatic  book  and 
document  feeding  equipment  is  necessary,  as  well  as  higher  performance  optical  and 
intelligent character recognition for languages other than English. 

English-language optical character recognition (OCR) systems have been tested and 
run  on  most  print  fonts  over  the  past  10  to  15  years,  and  have  been  enhanced  by 
automatic  or  semi-automatic  spelling  correction  algorithms.  Similar  systems  for 
other  languages  are  less  advanced,  which  leads  to  higher  costs  and  lower  quality 
results. 

Legal challenges: Digitisation presupposes making a copy, which can be problematic in view 
of  intellectual  property  rights  (IPR).  Directive  2001/29/EC  on  the  harmonisation  of  certain 
aspects  of  copyright  and  related  rights  in  the  information  society5  foresees  an  exception  for 
specific  acts  of  reproduction  by  publicly  accessible  libraries,  educational  establishments, 
museums  or  archives.  The  exception  is  however  not  mandatory  and  has  led  to  different 
implementations  in  the  Member  States.  The  limited  use  that  can  be  legally  made  of  the 
resulting digital copies is a further disincentive for digitisation. 

5. 

ONLINE ACCESSIBILITY 

The traditional model of library services based on lending of the physical items they own is 
not  easily  translatable  to  the  digital  environment.  Under  current  EU-law  and  international 
agreements, material resulting from digitisation can only be made available online if it is in 
the  public  domain6  or  with  the  explicit  consent  of  the  rightholders.  Therefore  a  European 
digital library will in principle be focused on public domain material. 

For  literature,  this  means  that  only  works  from  the  early  1900s  or  before  are 
available  without  copyright  restrictions,  depending  on  the  year  of  death  of  the 
author.  But  even  if  works  are  out  of  copyright,  the  situation  is  not  always 
straightforward. There may be rights attached to the different editions of a work that 
is itself no longer protected by copyrights, for example rights to introductions, covers 
and typography. 

An  online  library  offering  works  beyond  public  domain  material  is  not  possible  without  a 
substantial change in  the copyright legislation, or agreements, on a case by case basis, with 
the rightholders. 

In  this  context,  the  clarification  and  transparency  of  the  copyright  status  of  works  is  very 
relevant. In some cases, the costs of establishing the IPR-status of a work will be higher than 

5 
6 

European Parliament and Council directive of 22 May 2001, OJ L 167, 22.6.2001, p. 10. 
The term public domain is used here in a narrow sense, referring to information resources which can be 
freely accessed and used by all, for example because copyrights have expired. 

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its digitisation and bringing it online. This is particularly true for so called ‘orphan works’ – 
films  or  books  for  which  it  is  impossible  or  very  difficult  to  determine  who  are  the 
rightholders.  These  elements  are  highlighted  in  the  staff  working  paper  and  the  online 
consultation accompanying this document. 

Questions  of  online  accessibility  are  not  limited  to  intellectual  property  rights.  Putting 
material  online  does  not  mean  it  can  be  found  easily  by  the  user,  still  less  that  it  can  be 
searched  and  used.  Appropriate  services  allowing  the  user  to  discover  and  work  with  the 
content are necessary. This implies structured and quality description of the content, both the 
collections and the items in them, and support for its use (e.g. annotation). 

6. 

PRESERVING DIGITAL CONTENT  

Making  a  digital  copy  of  a  book  or  a  film  does  not  necessarily  guarantee  its  long-term 
survival. All digital  material  – digitised works as well as ‘born digital’ material – has to be 
maintained  in  order  to  keep  it  available  for  use.  Therefore  digitisation  without  a  proper 
preservation strategy can turn into a wasted investment. 

Digital  preservation  is  a  vital  problem  for  the  information  society,  where  the  supply  of 
information  is  growing  exponentially  and  where  content  is  becoming  more  and  more 
dynamic. At present, there is little experience with digital preservation, the legal framework is 
evolving,  resources  are  scarce  and  the  outcome  of  preservation  efforts  is  uncertain.  The 
problem  deserves  to  be  urgently  addressed  both  by  politicians  and  by  the  institutions  most 
concerned.  Its  impact  goes  far  beyond  the  realm  of  libraries  and  archives  and  concerns  all 
organisations producing digital information and interested in maintaining its availability. 

There  are  different  causes  for  the  loss  of  digital  content.  A  first  reason  is  the  succession  of 
generations of hardware that can render files unreadable. 

To  mark  the  900th  anniversary  of  the  Domesday  Book  in  1985,  a  new  multimedia 
edition  was  compiled.  In  2002,  it  looked  as  if  the  disc  had  become  unreadable  as 
computers capable of reading the format had become rare. To save it, a system was 
developed capable of accessing the discs using emulation techniques. Interestingly, 
while there are difficulties accessing digital data from 1986, the original Domesday 
Book, now over 900 years old, can still be consulted. 

The  rapid  succession  and  obsolescence  of  computer  programmes  is  another  factor.  Unless 
data  are  migrated  to  current  programs  or  care  is  taken  to  preserve  the  original  source  code, 
retrieval of information may become very costly, if not impossible. This is particularly true of 
‘closed’ data formats, for which the source code is not publicly known. The limited lifetime of 
digital  storage  devices,  for  example  CD-ROMs  is  another  reason  for  the  loss  of  digital 
content. 

Libraries and archives have started tackling the issues of preservation in the digital age at a 
limited  scale.  Some  collaboration  across  borders  exists,  but  overall  action  in  Europe  is 
fragmented.  Within  the  individual  Member  States  there  is,  in  general,  no  clear  policy  on 
digital  preservation.  Where  national  preservation  plans  do  exist  they  tend  to  concentrate  on 
safeguarding analogue material which is at risk, rather than venturing into the area of digital 
materials.  

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Most progress is made in the area of legal deposit, with Member States introducing obligatory 
deposit for digital materials to ensure that the material is collected and stored by the relevant 
institutions.  However,  at  present  the  scope  of  the  schemes  varies  widely  from  country  to 
country. For example, sometimes they cover dynamic online material, sometimes not. 

The basic challenges for digital preservation are similar to the ones for digitisation:  

Financial  challenges:  The  real  costs  of  long-term  digital  preservation  are  not  clear.  They 
depend on factors such as the number of migrations needed over time. It is, however, obvious 
that  due  to  the  limited  resources  available,  choices  have  to  be  made  as  to  which  material 
should be preserved. 

Organisational challenges: Choices are necessary, but who decides and who is responsible 
for  preserving  what?  In  an  area  where  some  basic  questions  are  far  from  being  answered, 
there  is  a  risk  of  widely  divergent  approaches  and  duplication  of  efforts.  European  added-
value  can  be  found  in  ensuring  complementarities  and  an  exchange  of  good  practices. 
Preserving  digital  information  also  requires  new  ways  of  working.  This  includes  upgrading 
the skills of staff as well as more collaboration between public and private players.  

Technical challenges: So far, limited research has been done on digital preservation. A major 
challenge is to improve its cost-efficiency and affordability. Advancing understanding of how 
to preserve high volumes of rapidly changing distributed information is another essential area 
to  be  addressed.  Progress  on  related  topics,  such  as  tools  for  automatic  analysis  and  for 
indexing will contribute to ensuring that information remains accessible and available for re-
use. 

Legal  challenges:  As  digital  preservation  depends  on  copying  and  migration,  it  has  to  be 
considered in the light of IPR legislation. Other challenges are related to the legal deposit of 
digital material: The diverging speed and scope of the legal measures adopted by the Member 
States  could  lead  to  a  patchwork  of  different  rules  affecting  content  producers  with  cross-
border  activities.  At  the  intersection  between  legal  deposit  and  IPRs,  the  introduction  of 
technological  protection  measures  to  prevent  copying,  or  of  digital  rights  management 
systems  restricting  the  access  to  digital  material  raises  a  whole  set  of  new  issues.  Legal 
deposit  schemes  may  fall  short  of  their  useful  purpose  if  unprotected  copies  are  not  made 
available by those who produce the information. 

7. 

THE EUROPEAN RESPONSE 

Organising  and  funding  the  digitisation  of  cultural  collections  and  digital  preservation  is 
primarily a responsibility of the Member States. There are, however, areas where considerable 
European added value can be achieved, and where work at European level has started some 
years ago. This work will now be stepped up and complemented by new activities. 

7.1. 

Initiatives under way 

Co-ordination at European level 

The  importance  of  digitising  Europe’s  cultural  heritage  was  already  recognised  by  the 
Commission in the eEurope action plan. This gave rise, in 2001, to the Lund Principles and 
the corresponding Lund action plan, and to the creation of a National Representatives Group 

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on  digitisation.  As  for  digital  preservation,  a  Council  resolution  of  2002  underlined  the 
importance of this issue and called on the Member States to address it.7 

For  the  audiovisual  sector,  the  draft  Parliament  and  Council  recommendation  on  the 
cinematographic  heritage  and  the  competitiveness  of  the  related  industrial  activities8  is 
particularly relevant. It calls on the Member States, amongst other things, to allow copying for 
preservation purposes. 

Co-funding 

EU research funding has resulted in a portfolio of projects aiming at making Europe’s cultural 
heritage  more  accessible  through  the  use  of  new  technologies.  Projects  supporting  co-
operation between Europe’s national libraries have developed from exchange of cataloguing 
records to The European Library project (TEL). TEL has now been launched as an operational 
service providing a single gateway to the collections of Europe’s national libraries.  

While only a few projects under the research programmes have started tackling the issue of 
digital preservation, several of the projects specifically address digitisation. One example, in 
which digitisation is used as a means to preserve analogue material, is PRESTOSPACE. 

PRESTOSPACE  (2004-2007,  9  MEUR  co-funding)  is  developing  a  toolkit  which 
audiovisual archives can use to digitise audiovisual material. The tools will lead to 
more affordable and better quality digitisation in view of converting and preserving 
analogue audiovisual material. 

7.2. 

New or reinforced initiatives 

Strategic discussion with stakeholders and reinforced co-ordination 

On  the  basis  of  the  questions  in  Annexe  II  to  this  Communication,  there  will  be  an  online 
consultation  on  organisational,  legal  and  technical  challenges  for  digitisation,  online 
accessibility of content and digital preservation. The results will be an important input for a 
possible Recommendation on digitisation and digital preservation. They will feed into other 
processes, such as the implementation of the Community RTD programmes and the revision 
of the copyrights framework. A High Level Expert Group on digital libraries will advise the 
Commission on how to best address the identified challenges at European level. 

The  Commission  will  increase  its  efforts  to  stimulate  European  co-operation  on  digitisation 
and digital preservation. The aim is to give a new impetus to the digitisation  process  in  the 
Member  States,  to  avoid  duplication  of  effort,  and  to  encourage  take-up  of  good  practices. 
The  update  of  the  Lund  action-plan,  scheduled  under  the  UK  presidency,  can  have  an 
important  function  in  this  respect,  dealing  with  a  number  of  technical  aspects.  The  use  of 
quantitative  indicators  within  the  Lund-context  would  help  to  measure  progress  throughout 
Europe. 

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Council  Resolution  of  25  June  2002,  Preserving  tomorrow's  memory:  preserving  digital  content  for 
future  generations,  OJ  C  162,  6.7.2002,  p.  4.  The  issue  is  also  touched  upon  in  the  Commission 
proposal of 18.2.2005 for a Council recommendation on priority actions to increase cooperation in the 
field of archives of Europe, COM(2005) 53 final. 
Agreed between Parliament and Council in first reading, but not yet formally adopted. 

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Special  attention  will  be  devoted  to  the  work  of  the  national  and  deposit  libraries, 
predominant actors and committed to contributing to a European digital library. 

Co-funding 

At Community level, the Research and eContentplus programmes will be mobilised towards 
actions  with  a  European  interest  and  scale  on  digitisation,  digital  preservation  and 
accessibility of cultural content. The Regional Funds already co-fund digitisation initiatives in 
some of the Member States and could further contribute to digitisation. 

Applied digitisation of cultural heritage has become an objective of cooperation projects co-
financed under the “Culture 2000” programme in an increasing number of cases; within the 
“Culture 2007” programme as proposed by the Commission, co-funding will be available for 
cooperation  projects  improving  the  transnational  circulation  of  cultural  works  and  products, 
including through digitisation and online access. 

Research 

Under the research programmes, the Commission will take the following specific initiatives 
in  the  area  of  cultural  content,  next  to  ongoing  generic  content-related  research  (search 
engines, language technologies, etc): 

The latest call of the Information Society Technologies programme, closed on 21 September 
2005, has earmarked 36 MEUR for research on new technologies for searching and retrieving 
cultural content (22 MEUR) and for digital preservation (14 MEUR).  

Under  the  seventh  Framework  Programme,  the  Commission  proposes  to  expand  its 
contribution  to  research  in  the  areas  of  digitisation,  access  to  digital  cultural  content  and 
digital  preservation.  Technological  progress  in  this  area  is  proposed,  amongst  others,  to  be 
stimulated through a network of Centres of Competence, which could become the cornerstone 
of European digitisation and preservation. The Community would contribute to these Centres 
by co-financing projects. 

The  Centres,  selected  through  calls  for  proposals,  will  house  the  different 
competencies  –  technical  and  legal  –  needed  to  achieve  excellence  for  digitisation 
and  preservation  processes.  They  will  integrate  and  build  on  existing  know-how  in 
technology  companies,  universities,  cultural 
institutions,  and  other  relevant 
organisations. They will: 

-  do  research  and  support  advanced  technical  solutions,  testing  and  benchmarking 
them in practice on high volumes of resources; 

- promote the adaptation and transfer of these solutions to cultural institutions; 

- transfer knowledge to and support the development of skills in the user institutions. 

eContentplus 

Within the eContentplus programme, 60 MEUR will be available in the period 2005-2008 for 
projects improving the accessibility and usability of European cultural and scientific content. 
Achieving  interoperability  between  national  digital  collections  and  services  (e.g.  through 

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common  standards)  and  facilitating  access  and  use  of  the  material  in  a  multilingual  context 
will be core objectives. 

In summary: 

Strategic discussion with stakeholders and reinforced co-ordination  

•  Online consultation on digitisation and digital preservation (Commission 2005) 

•  Establishment of High Level Expert Group (Commission 2005) 

•  Proposal  for  a  Recommendation  on  digitisation  and  digital  preservation  (Commission 

2006) 

•  Input  for  relevant  initiatives  such  as  the  review  of  the  copyright  rules  (2006)  and  the 

implementation of FP7 (2007) 

•  Update  Lund  action  plan  (including  quantitative  indicators)  and  discussion  in  Council 
on commitment MS to digitisation and digital preservation (MS/Commission 2005) 

•  Catalyse  and  stimulate  work  of  the  national  libraries  (Commission/national  libraries 

2005-2007) 

Co-funding 

•  36 MEUR in call 5 FP6 (2005) 

•  Increased  research  effort  on  digitisation,  digital  preservation  and  access  to  cultural 

content in FP7 (2007) 

•  Centres of Competence on digitisation and preservation in FP7 (2007) 

•  60 MEUR in eContentplus (2005-2008) 

8. 

CONCLUSION 

Information technologies have the potential to make Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage 
visible and available for present and future use. This requires a common effort at the level of 
the Member States - whose efforts on digitisation and digital preservation are at present very 
much fragmented - and at Community level. A successful response to the challenges involved 
can speed up digitisation, increase the accessibility of information and ensure the long term 
preservation  of  digital  content.  The  Commission  invites  the  European  Parliament  and  the 
Council  to  endorse  the  approach  presented  and  Member  States  to  join  the  efforts  at  Union 
level to make digital libraries a reality across Europe. 

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