15 experts from South and South-East Asia participated in the workshop organised by IFLA 6-7 July 2017 in Colombo, Sri Lanka, to discuss the challenges concerning tools and standards for preservation of palm leaf manuscripts.

PLMs are an ancient document form that comprises a significant documentary heritage in the South and South-East Asia region. Throughout the workshop it became clear that each country has its own PLMs types, methods for storage and preservation and management of the manuscripts. The digitization of PLMs has been carried out using different standards or even no standard at all.

To achieve Target 11.4 of the UN Sustainable Development Goals – safeguarding cultural heritage, it is necessary to jointly develop metadata standard for PLMs management for the region. The report from the scoping workshop aims to explain the challenges of PLMs managements, and sets out recommendations for implementation of coordinated regional work. The participants will continue to work together to deliver a metadata framework, as well to explore other releveant issues.

Read the report for more.