Institutional Repositories and Libraries in Nigeria: Interrogating the Nexus

Institutional repositories (IRs) are emerging trends in scholarly discourse among members of the academic community in Nigeria. Global practice shows that many IRs are administered by librarians in the academia. This article examines the nexus between libraries and IRs. It observed that though the emergence of IRs holds great advantage for academic institutions, many Nigerian institutions, especially universities, do not have functional IRs because of the inability of their libraries to run them. The article further identifies the digital divide, inadequate financing, the lack of ICT skills and awareness as well as copyright issues as challenges inhibiting the establishment and management of IRs in Nigeria. Recommendations are made for dealing with the identified challenges.