One of the goals of the Ministry of Culture during the past few years has been to improve the availability of cultural works to the general public via the Internet. With this goal, the Ministry has carried out various initiatives including the following:
- the Portal of Spanish Archives, a web-based database for the diffusion of national historical documentary heritage;
- the Virtual Library of Bibliographical Heritage that allows users to consult a wide range of online documents from Spain’s bibliographical heritage;
- the Virtual Library of Historical Newspapers which participates in Europeana and EuropeanaLocal projects;
- the Museum Libraries Network (BIMUS) which allows access to the catalogues of libraries from 18 state-owned museums;
- Hispana, the Digital Collections of Archives, Libraries and Museums (with functions that are analogous to those of Europeana), and
- CER.es, the online catalogue of the Digital Network of Collections of 80 Museums located in 11 Autonomous Communities, which offers unified access to cultural assets of Spanish museums.
The Culture Plan 2020, passed in March 2017, also incorporates the improvement and technological modernisation of state archives, libraries and museums as a tool to promote a cultural offer of quality. Two outstanding initiatives are:
- the dissemination of the new version of the Portal of Spanish Archives (PARES 2.0 Beta), a web-based database for the diffusion of national historical documentary heritage and the possibility of consultation of the archival heritage through mobile devices;
- the promotion of a unique catalogue of Spanish authors in the National Library of Spain aimed at improving the knowledge and dissemination of Spanish authors in the public domain.
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