Big leap in Sabah library members

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KOTA KINABALU: The number of State Library members had almost tripled from 60,000 last year to 170,000 now.

Disclosing this yesterday, State Library Director Wong Vui Yin said efforts are being made to raise interest in reading among the local people.

He said even though various programmes were held to encourage local people to read, the awareness is still low.

“One of the factors causing low reading awareness is the lack of reading materials in the state compared to other developed states in the country.

“The Sabah State Library wants to encourage people to apply to be its members because we are regularly increasing reading materials,” he said during the presentation of a book by Bryan Lo to the State Library here yesterday.

He added the government is committed to raise awareness on the benefits of reading among local people by increasing not only reading materials but also the number of libraries throughout the state.

He pointed out that throughout Sabah, they have eight Desa@Net coaches and 13 mobile coaches to encourage rural folk to read.

“The Desa@Net coaches are equipped with 10 computers to teach the rural students how to use the Internet and Microsoft software while the mobile coaches is a mobile library that brings reading materials to the rural areas.

“We intend to increase the number of Desa@Net and mobile coaches throughout the state to ensure the rural folk will be provided with enough reading materials,” he said.

“We are also planning to have a new state library branch in Pulau Banggi following the agropolitant project that is believed to increase the number of tourists on the island. We believe the island has an interesting future that will boost the tourism industry,” he said.