Digital preservation needs assessment

A priority of the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC) in recent years has been to establish the extent of digital preservation needs in the UK.

In February 2006 the DPC published a report which revealed that fewer than 20% of UK organisations surveyed had a strategy in place to deal with the risk of loss or degradation to their digital resources - despite a very high level of awareness of the risks and potential economic penalties. With the publication of the report, Mind the gap: assessing digital preservation needs in the UK , the coalition aims to help government, public institutions and private companies turn high awareness into concerted action.

The survey reveals that the loss of digital data is commonplace - it is seen as an inevitable hazard by some - with more than 70% of respondents saying data had been lost in their organisation. Awareness of the potential economic and cultural risks is high, with 87% recognising that corporate memory or key cultural material could be lost and some 60% saying that their organisation could lose out financially. In 52% of the organisations surveyed there was management commitment to digital preservation - but only 18% had a strategy in place.

A pdf version of the report is available on the DPC website: Mind the Gap.

The report builds on previous work, including MLA's survey of Digital Preservation in the Regions, which involved a sample of museums, libraries and archives in two English regions - the North East and the West Midlands.