The secretary general of the Writers Association of The Gambia (WAG) disagrees on the notion that the coming into being of the electronic book (e-book) will eliminate the printed ones.    
“The fate of the printed book remains at the balance,” Mr Cherno O Barry, who doubles as programme officer, UNESCO/Natcom has said. “There is no better feeling than getting a good print book scratching the fingers as you read a story.”
He added: “Everyone will wonder if new technologies would one day make libraries disappear. The answer is definite no.”
Mr Barry said, the existence of digital libraries help people access books in electronic format, but the new technology is spurring up so fast it has not commensurate the buying power of the average person.
According to him, libraries around the world are using the new media and technologies to their advantage.
“It has become possible to digitalised old documents that are of national and international heritage. Access to libraries has also been made easier for so many people who can now search and even access materials from libraries and research centrer at a great distance.”
Mr Barry made this observation on Wednesday at the National Library in Banjul on the occasion of the World Book and Copyright Day while speaking on the topic: “The Evolution of Book Production from Writing to Digital: Their Complementary and Future Challenges.” The event was organised by NATCOM.
Also speaking, the Director General of the national library Mr Abdou Wally Mbye expressed the need for more Gambians books, especially for Gambian children.
“Seeing heroes and main characters with whom the children share the same colour and names can make them readily identify them,” he said. “This is more so where Gambian towns, villages and other scenery are featured in positive and beautiful ways. These positive images would give them more hope, optimism and pride in themselves.”
Mbye pointed out that the saying that ‘there is no reading culture in Gambia’ appears to be accepted as an established truth, even though there is no empirical data on reading habit in the country.
He added: “We are also branded as deriving more pleasure from talking, socialising, dancing, wrestling or other forms of merry making. Also in discussing related issues like educational attainment levels, literacy, publishing, bookselling or a dearth of reading culture.
He added further: “While agreeing to the dearth of books, an absence of bookshops, and indeed an under-developed publishing industry in this country, it is nevertheless my contention that a reading culture is absent in this country.”
 Mr Hassoum Ceesay, the Director of Copyrights bureau said prior to 2003, the copyright law that subsisted in Gambia was a colonial inheritance dating back to 1915 and only covered printed materials.
“Given the advances in technology that have occurred since then the need of a new copy right law was long overdue,” he added. “Gambia Copyright Act 2004 protects all creative rights.”