NATIONAL BIBLIOGRAPHIC-CONTROL OF SERIALS IN AUSTRALIA, 1980-1990

There is a long history of effective co-operation and national initiatives in controlling and sharing serial data in Australia. Prior to the 1980's this largely took the form of manually produced national union catalogues such as Scientific Serials in Australian Libraries; Serials in Australian Libraries, Social Sciences and the Humanities; and Newspapers in Australian Libraries. The commencement of the Australian Bibliographic Network (ABN) in 1980 provided the mechanism for both a national shared cataloguing venture and a truly national on-line union catalogue. The National Union Catalogue of Serials produced from ABN was dependent on the addition of holdings by ABN participating libraries. Several factors contributed to the growth of serials data on the national bibliographic database-notably the steady increase in the number of ABN participants undertaking serials cataloguing on ABN, serial conversion work on titles in the National Library card catalogues, and major serial conversion work undertaken by other Australian libraries. Although much has been achieved in the 1980's there remains much to be done to enhance the coverage of bibliographic and holdings data for serials on ABN.