Introduction
    The Library of the Statistical Centre of Iran (LSCI) is the offspring of the former Statistical Archives, an integrated part of the former General Department of Public Statistics, which was established in 1965 and later evolved to the Statistical Centre of Iran. The Statistics Archives turned into a library in 1976, when the building blocks of library were added to its already-existing sources and documents, and subsequently all were organized according to an international standard scientific classification _ Dewey's Decimal Classification.
The LSCI, as the only statistics_specific library in Iran, receives a wide range of users and researchers. In addition to the library's rich resources, good treatment of the users information needs, users free access to the resources, lack of restrictions for visiting the library, the library's mechanized system, and xerox and audio-visual aids, all have contributed to an overall user content, The library is always seeking to upgrade its services through employing state-of-the- art methods and technologies.
In this regard, facility for connection to the Library via internet is provided. Users can click on the " connection to the library "  icon in the first page of homepage, to access to the base.

Resources
The library, with a rich collection of statistical books and periodicals in Farsi and English (also some other languages) and documents of statistical surveys, along with rendering statistical information services, is considered the major provider of statistical information in the country. The library's major resources are the outcomes of the National Censuses of Population and Housing (1956, 1966, 1976, 1986 and 1996), outputs of other censuses and sample surveys, statistical yearbooks of Iran and other countries, international yearbooks from such organizations as the United Nations and its affiliated bodies, and reference books. The rest of the books and publications are in statistics, economics, demography, agriculture, etc.

Types of resources:
Books : 20000 titles (14000 titles in farsi)
Periodicals : 220 titles (120 titles in Farsi)
Documents of statistical projects : 800 titles
Audio - Visual materials : (400 CDs, 93 videotapes, 50 maps, 52 graphs, 40 floppy discs, and microfilms)

Sections

A.Technical services section
1.New materials collection unit, A major task of the unit is to provide new information resources as well as updating the existing materials to meet the users information needs. The new resources are usually provided from local and international book fairs. The unit is in contact with some 50 local and foreign publishers, as well as 70 international organizations.
The resources are provided through 4 major channels :
a. Foreign exchange purchase,
b. Rial purchase,
c. Purchase by UNESCO coupons,
d. Exchange or donation.

2. Organizing unit, The unit is responsible for preparation of resources which takes in cataloging the books and audio-visual materials, indexing documents of statistical projects, filing, data entry, etc. Both manual and computerized systems are being used at once. The software in use is Simorgh, a comprehensive information system in wide area networks (WAN), with high capability of storing data and data retrieval. It retains all the library's data. Now, all the library's data is accessible on internet.

B.Public services section
1.Reference services, It refers to any help given to the users by the librarians to find the sources and information they are looking for. The library has always considered it a must to be responsive to all users as far as the library's sphere of activities is concerned. The unit is responsible for providing users with the information on the related available resources in the LSCI and/or other libraries or institutions, helping them to be able to use catalogue files and card cabinet to get to the sources and documents they are in need of, and finally enabling them to make use of reference books.

2. Circulation unit, The circulation unit activities based on the LSCI's circulation regulations which restricts membership to only the Centre's staff and charges the unit to generally guide users at their arrival to the library. Issuance of membership cards, and input of members data and data on charging of books to the circulation database, are other tasks of the unit.

3. Xerox unit, Almost all the visitors to the library request some copies of some documents. So the xerox unit, as an active part of the library, is a great help to both the staff and the visitors.

C. Magazines section
The section takes in :
1. Over 120 Farsi titles and some 100 English titles in statistics, economics, demography, etc; The rather rich collection of high-circulation English magazines in statistics - the presence of some of which in the library backs to 50 years ago - attracts a great number of researchers and students.

2. Newsletters and bulletins from such international organizations as ISI, ESCAP, SIAP, and IMF;

3. Periodical statistical reports from the Centre and some other public organizations such as Central Bank of I.R. of Iran and the National Meteorological Organization.

4. New papers: Includes 9 Persian news paper,

D. Audio-visual section
This section is responsible for collection, organization and presentation of pictures, maps, posters, graphs, slides, microfilms, microfiches, videos, floppies, compact discs, cassettes and other non-print media.
The collections of photos and videos concerning some major activities of the Statistical Centre of Iran - censuses for example - are also kept in this section. The major part of information collected in AV section is statistical information in such forms as graphs, microfilms, and CDs, received from countries around the world and domestic and international organizations, particularly the United Nations. To fulfil the library's educational task, the AV section has collected some 500 titles of videos, CDs and cassettes in learning English and a number of softwares, which might be used by the library members in AV room by the help of audio-visual aids provided there (PCs, VCDs, cassette recorders, etc).

Computer search of the so-called Current Index of Statistics (CIS), which offers global information on outstanding articles, magazines and books in statistics, is one of the most important services provided by the section. Another usage of available data banks in this section is, Index data Bank, which provides data on articles published in Persian magazines and newspapers; and is facilitated with searching subject, author and title.
The library is open to the public and is located in the Statistical Centre of Iran Bldg.No.1,Dr.Fatemi Ave.,Tehran, Iran.
Library: 009821-88969892

Bureau of publication and Information Dissemination: 009821-88965462

SCI: 009821-88965061-9
E-mail : library@sci.org.ir