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Breadcrumb

  1. Home
  2. Methodology and quality
  3. ESMS metadata
  4. Public library

Public library

1. Contact
1.1. Contact organisation

Statistics Estonia

1.2. Contact organisation unit

Population and Social Statistics Department

1.3. Contact name

Erik Lest

1.4. Contact person function

Analyst

1.5. Contact mail address

20 Narva Rd., 51009 Tartu, Estonia

1.6. Contact email address

erik.lest [at] stat.ee

1.7. Contact phone number

37258860456

2. Metadata update
2.1. Metadata last certified

27/03/2025

2.2. Metadata last update

27/03/2025

3. Statistical presentation
3.1. Data description

Number of public libraries, special and scientific libraries, and school libraries; users, physical and virtual visits, library units lent, type of library/school, total collection and number of employees

Financial data of public libraries and special and scientific libraries

3.2. Classification system

Classification of Estonian administrative units and settlements (EHAK)

Estonian Classification of Territorial Units for Statistics

The classification of libraries is based on the international standard EVS/ISO 2789:2014 “Information and documentation. International library statistics”, which has been adapted to the Estonian situation and existing libraries.

3.3. Sector coverage

Libraries

3.4. Statistical concepts and definitions

Acquisition cost – expenditure on renewing the stock (incl. newspapers and magazines).

Annual volume – set of issues of a periodical published within a year.

Audio-visual document – document in which sound and/or pictures are prominent and which requires the use of special equipment (CD, DVD, VHS, etc.) or computer network to be seen and/or heard.

Book – independent publication printed or handwritten and bound together, with at least 49 pages (in statistical questionnaires, books include pamphlets, bound maps, sheets of music, graphic documents, normative documents, serials, books for the blind).

Collection, stock – all documents provided by a library for its users (e.g. books, newspapers, magazines, music documents, etc.), held locally or in remote resources for which access rights have been acquired at least for a certain period of time. The data on the main collection are presented as at the end of the calendar year, for school libraries at the end of the academic year.

Database – collection of electronically stored data (facts, bibliographic records, texts, etc.) with a common user interface and software for the retrieval and manipulation of data.

Document – recorded information or material object treated as a unit. Documents may differ in their format and characteristics. Documents are, for example, a book, manuscript, photograph or CD, which are either in a physical or digital format.

Digital document – unit of information with limited content and which is digitised in the library or acquired in digital format. Covers e-books, electronic patent descriptions, networked audiovisual documents and other digital documents (e.g., reports, cartographic and music docu¬ments, preprints, etc.). Databases and elect¬ronic serials are excluded. A digital document may consist of one or more files.

E-book – licenced or open access digital resource that is not part of a series, in which searchable text dominates and which is a version of a printed book (monograph). The data for e-books cover only web resources.

Electronic unit – database, electronic serial or digital document.

Employees – full-time or part-time employees working under contract of employment as at December 31 (headcount). In the case of school libraries, only librarians are counted as employees (whose number is presented at the end of the academic year).

Labour costs – costs on wages and salaries of all employees, including temporary workers, with calculated social tax (basic wage, bonuses, holiday pay, guarantees and allowances paid in the cases prescribed by the law and other labour associated costs).

Librarians – persons working in a position which requires a library profession and whose work is related to the main activity of the library. It also includes library management and other specialists working in the library (bookbinders, microfilm makers, restorers, bookkeepers, human resources workers, IT specialists, etc.).

Library – organisation or part of an organisation, the main aim of which is to facilitate the use of such information resources, services and facilities as are required to meet the educational, research, informational, cultural or recreational needs of its users.

Library offering public services – library open for everyone and serving the community free of charge.

Library of other higher education institution – library which serves students, academic and professional staff in colleges, private and other higher education institutions.

Library (or physical) unit – single document or a collection of documents (for instance, a language textbook with cassettes), which can be treated as a separate unit. Since 1993, the unit of newspapers and magazines is the annual volume.

Loan, unit lent – lending or delivery of a library document to a user for temporary use. Renewals and registered loans for in-house use are included.

Magazine, journal – serial publication which is published under the same title for an indefinite period either at regular or irregular intervals and the individual issues of which are sequentially numbered or dated. In statistics, annual volumes and titles are counted.

Manuscript – original document that is handwritten or in typescript.

National library – library that is responsible for collecting and storing all relevant documents in the country in which the library is located. It can also serve all or some of the following functions: compiling the national bibliography; storing and building a representative collection of foreign literature, incl. documents about the country of location published abroad; acting as the national centre of bibliographical information; compiling shared catalogues; advising organisation of work of other libraries and/or promoting cooperation; coordinating research and development activities, etc.

Newspaper – serial publication which contains news of special or general interest. Its individual issues are sequentially numbered or dated and it is usually issued at least once a week. In statistics, titles and new annual volumes are counted.

Public library – includes libraries offering public services which are open for everyone and serving the community free of charge as well as libraries for special categories of users (e.g. in welfare instutions and prisons).

(Registered) user – person registered with a library in order to use its collection and/or services within or away from the library. Every user is counted only once even if he or she is a registered user of several departments of a library.

School library – study library, which offers students and teachers literate, audiovisual documents and other resources necessary for study and educational activities and self-development. Collection of textbooks is not considered a school library.

Scientific library – library serving scientific work and researchers. Its synonym is “research library”.

Serial publication – document in print or non-print (e.g. electronic) format, issued in successive parts at any interval, usually sequentially numbered or dated and continuously issued (e.g. newspapers and magazines).

Special library – independent library focusing on one discip¬line and which most likely serves a special category of users (enterprise, institution, organisation, company, public limited company, etc.).

Special modes of technical literature (data published for 2000?2004) – standards, price-lists, patents and other documents with specific structure.

Study collection – part of the collection of a school library (e.g. textbooks, workbooks, information resources with an educational purpose, etc.).

Title – words at the beginning of a document which identify the document and generally distinguish it from others. In statistics, it refers to a document which forms a separate whole with an identifying title, issued either in one or several volumes. The number of copies of a document stored in a library is excluded.

Universal library – unspecialised scientific library which acquires, stores and lends documents from all (scientific) areas. The typology of scientific libraries changed in 2003 – the former Estonian Academic Library became Tallinn Pedagogical University Academic Library in 2003 and Tallinn City University Academic Library in 2005. As of 2005, the data of universal libraries are included under other special libraries.

University library – scientific library which serves students, academic and professional staff in universities. Can also serve as a central scientific library.

Virtual visit (web visit, website visit) – user visit to the library website from outside the library, irrespective of the number of pages or components visited. Virtual visits are comparable to traditional library visits.

Visit – a single user visit to the library, irrespective of how many departments are visited as well as participation in events organised by the library.

3.5. Statistical unit

Library

3.6. Statistical population

Libraries

FRAME

Libraries who submitted a report to the National Library of Estonia

3.7. Reference area

Estonia as a whole – data about special and research libraries

Counties data about public and school libraries

Administrative units – data about public libraries of general use

3.8. Time coverage

1990–…

3.9. Base period

Not applicable

4. Unit of measure

Libraries – number

Users, physical and virtual visits, employees – number

Library units lent, total collection – (thousand) library units

Financial data – thousand euros

5. Reference period

Year

6. Institutional mandate
6.1. Legal acts and other agreements

DIRECTLY APPLICABLE LEGAL ACTS

Not available

OTHER LEGAL ACTS

NO_ENGLISH_VALUE

OTHER AGREEMENTS

2009 UNESCO framework for cultural statistics

7. Confidentiality
7.1. Confidentiality - policy

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 32, § 34, § 35, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act.

7.2. Confidentiality - data treatment

The treatment of confidential data is regulated by the Procedure for Protection of Data Collected and Processed by Statistics Estonia (in Estonian). See more details on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section Õigusaktid.

8. Release policy
8.1. Release calendar

Notifications about the dissemination of statistics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on 1 October, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month).

8.2. Release calendar access

Calendar

8.3. User access

All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. If there is also a news release, it is published simultaneously with data in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8:00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar.

9. Frequency of dissemination

Annual

10. Accessibility and clarity
10.1. News release

Not published

10.2. Publications

Not published

10.3. Online database

Data are published in the statistical database at https://andmed.stat.ee/en/stat under the subject area “Social life / Culture / Libraries” in the following tables:

KU01: Public libraries

KU014: Public libraries by county

KU015: Public libraries by type

KU0155: Collections of public libraries by county, 31 december

KU0157: Income and expenditure of public libraries by county

KU017: Public libraries offering public services by region/administrative unit

KU02: Special and scientific libraries by type

KU021: Income and expenditure of special and scientific libraries by type of library

KU022: Special and scientific libraries by type

KU023: Main collections of special and scientific libraries by type of library, 31 december

KU03: School libraries

KU031: School libraries by county

KU032: School libraries by type of school

KU033: School libraries by type of school and language of instruction at school

KU034: Main collections of school libraries by type of school

10.4. Microdata access

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 33, § 34, § 35, § 36, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. Access to microdata and anonymisation of microdata are regulated by Statistics Estonia’s procedure for dissemination of confidential data for scientific purposes.

10.5. Other

Data serve as input for statistical activity 50101 “Regional development”.

10.6. Documentation on methodology

The international standard EVS/ISO 2789:2014 “Information and documentation. International library statistics”

10.7. Quality documentation

Not available

11. Quality management
11.1. Quality assurance

To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the EFQM Excellence Model, the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the requirements in § 7. “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act.

11.2. Quality assessment

Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is overall evaluation using information gathered in each phase or sub-process; this information can take many forms, including feedback from users, process metadata, system metrics and suggestions from employees. This information is used to prepare the evaluation report which outlines all the quality problems related to the specific statistical activity and serves as input for improvement actions.

12. Relevance
12.1. User needs

Ministry of Culture

Ministry of Education and Research

12.2. User satisfaction

Since 1996, Statistics Estonia has conducted reputation and user satisfaction surveys. All results are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section User surveys.

12.3. Completeness

Use of administrative data ensures complete coverage and timeliness.

13. Accuracy and reliability
13.1. Overall accuracy

Using administrative data ensures data accuracy. Units not submitting the questionnaire are excluded; this may result in under-coverage.

13.2. Sampling error

Not applicable

13.3. Non-sampling error

During data entry, the people who enter the data in the register may make mistakes which are impossible to discover. Institutions may not update all the data annually as required.

14. Timeliness and punctuality
14.1. Timeliness

The data about public and special and research libraries are published 150 days after the end of the reference year (T + 150), the data about school libraries are published 120 days after the end of the reporting period (school-year) (T + 120).

14.2. Punctuality

The data have been published at the time announced in the release calendar.

15. Coherence and comparability
15.1. Comparability - geographical

The data for Estonia are comparable by counties, regions and within Tallinn. In 2002 – 2017, the data on public libraries for general service were comparable at municipality level but after the administrative reform, a new time series was started in 2018.

15.2. Comparability - over time

In Estonia, the main data on public libraries have been published since 1990, the data on specialized and scientific libraries since 1994 and on school libraries since 1993. The main data are largely comparable over time. Due to changes in the types of certain libraries, the merging of libraries (e.g. all the libraries of the Defence Forces have been counted as one since 2014) and other rearrangements, there have been some data changes, which are not as substantial as to disrupt the time series.

15.3. Coherence - cross domain

The statistical activities 40410 “Public library” and 40415 “Printed matter” are coherent, as the concepts used in both activities (e.g. book, magazine, newspaper, title) are essentially identical.

15.4. Coherence - internal

The outputs of the statistical activity are coherent. Due to rounding, the sums received by adding numbers in tables are not always equal with the total.

16. Cost and burden

17. Data revision
17.1. Data revision - policy

The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described in the section Principles of dissemination of official statistics of the website of Statistics Estonia.

17.2. Data revision - practice

Not applicable

18. Statistical processing
18.1. Source data

SURVEY DATA

Not used

ADMINISTRATIVE DATA

The following data are received from the National Library of Estonia: the number of users and employees, total collections and their divisions and financial indicators of public libraries, special and research libraries and school libraries.

DATA FROM OTHER STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES

Not used

18.2. Frequency of data collection

Annual

18.3. Data collection

Libraries submit a report to the National Library of Estonia.

Statistics Estonia receives aggregated data from the National Library of Estonia by e-mail.

18.4. Data validation

The data are compared with the data of previous periods. All columns are checked to make sure that they have been completed as required.

18.5. Data compilation

The collected data are converted into statistical output. This includes calculating additional indicators.

18.6. Adjustment

Not applicable

19. Comments

Not available

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