Open Repository Blog

Aiding those in poverty: Oxfam GB partners with Open Repository

Today Oxfam GB, a leading international charity with a worldwide reputation for excellence in the delivery of humanitarian aid and development work, has adopted Open Repository’s enhanced DSpace hosted solution. 

When Oxfam began a project to create a website to handle their policy, practice and research materials for professional audiences, they realized there was no single, secure deposit location for their  digital assets on poverty and suffering worldwide. Hence, they decided to implement a repository that could store their digital assets in multiple formats, have simple search and deposit functions to suit users with no background in repository use, and therefore enable Oxfam to showcase their large and ever evolving output of research, program learning and policy information to a global audience.

Having decided they needed a repository, Oxfam chose to implement a hosted solution because they lacked dedicated resources in-house to develop, manage and support one. By partnering with Open Repository, they received a customized repository: the Oxfam iLibrary comes  from a “tried and tested” company which incorporates advanced open source features and upgrades. This removed the internal technical demands required of an in-house solution, allowing Oxfam to focus on developing the content of the repository with their staff worldwide and ensuring quality metadata so their content is easy to find.

Speaking as the new system went live, Robert Cornford, Communications Manager from Oxfam GB said, “We have had a very interesting experience working with Open Repository to establish the Oxfam iLibrary, from working out a classification system for our very varied content through developing a remote deposit structure so people across our programme offices with limited IT experience can upload materials, to integrating with a separate website. We now have a repository where we can capture our experience for internal programme development, and share our knowledge externally easily and quickly through the website.  Our repository, the Oxfam iLibrary, will have an immediate impact on our own ways of working internally and, with our new information website now live, will make our content available to external audiences across the world.”

To learn more about why Oxfam chose a repository and how it was implemented, read their case study.

To see the new Oxfam website for development professionals, fed from the Oxfam iLibrary, visit to the Oxfam Policy and Practice website.

To learn more about how Open Repository can help you meet your open access requirements, please get in touch.

Posted by Nishkala Thiru at 15:37    Comments (0)