In the morning of 9 September, the International Symposium on Libraries • Keeping Pace with the Times was opened in the National Library of China (NLC), which lasted for 2 days.

Luo Shugang, Minister of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Zhang Xu, Vice Minister of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Wang Meng, former Minister of the Ministry of Culture and Director of the National Library Council, Zhou Heping, former Minister of the Ministry of Culture and former Director of the NLC, Nie Zhenning, Chairman of Taofen Foundation, Gerald Leitner, Secretary-General of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), Rao Quan, Director of the NLC, and Chen Chao, Director of Shanghai Library (Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of Shanghai) attended the symposium, and addressed speeches. Experts from more than 10 countries such as America, Britain, Canada, Egypt, New Zealand, Singapore, and so on, scholars from domestic library community, library workers, journalists, totaling about 300 people, attended the symposium, which was hosted by Wei Dawei, Secretary of the CPC Committee of the NLC and Deputy Director of the NLC.

In his speech, Luo Shugang, Minister of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, extended congratulations to the NLC. He said that the NLC had been adhering to the tenet of "Inheriting civilization and Serve the society" since its establishment. After generations of employees' hard work and struggle, the NLC had played important roles in preserving national civilization achievements, inheriting and carrying forward Chinese excellent traditional culture, improving citizens' science and culture quality, and promoting international cultural exchanges. Meanwhile, he hoped that the NLC and public libraries around the country would stick to the central committee's decisions and plans, seize historical opportunities, live up to the great trust of the times, and make greater contributions to the great development and prosperity of socialist culture. At the same time, he hoped that more experts and scholars from the international library community would come to China for study and exchanges, so as to jointly promote the librarianship development around the world.

In his speech, Rao Quan, Director of the NLC, reviewed the 110 years' history of the NLC, made an outlook for the NLC's future, introduced the symposium theme, and looked forward to in-depth exchanges between domestic and foreign library colleagues who actively shared advanced experiences and jointly planned the blueprint for the transformation and development of librarianship in the new era. Adhering to the tenet of "Inheriting civilization and Serve the society", the NLC would inherit the past and open a new chapter for the future.

Gerald Leitner and Chen Chao addressed a speech on behalf of the IFLA and Shanghai Library (Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of Shanghai), Shanghai Library Association, and Shanghai Society for Library Science. They highly appraised the NLC's work, wished greater development of Chinese librarianship, and whished the International Symposium on Libraries • Keeping Pace with the Times a complete success.

In the keynote speech session, Rao Quan, Director of the NLC, Gerald Leitner, Cheng Huanwen, Professor at the School of Information Management in Sun Yat-sen University made a speech respectively, namely, The Experience and Transformation of Chinese Librarianship, Gate Keeper to Gate Opener: A New Role for the Global Library Community, and The Evolving Academic Thoughts on Chinese Librarianship in the International Perspective.

Rao Quan, Director of the NLC, introduced the development path of librarianship with Chinese characteristics, the new opportunities and challenges faced by Chinese librarianship and how to open a new era of high-quality development of Chinese librarianship in terms of reviewing history, basing on the current status and looking forward to the future. Gerald Leitner and Cheng Huanwen introduced the new roles transformation of the global library community and the development of Chinese library academic thought respectively.

This international symposium was a beneficial attempt by the NLC to fulfil its duty of international exchanges and promoting civilizations exchanges and mutual learning, which was of positive significance for promoting the development of Chinese librarianship and strengthening the exchange and cooperation among international libraries. During the symposium, several sessions on different themes were held, including "Memory and Inheritance: Open and Shared Document Resources Construction", "Transformation and Transcendence: User-Oriented Information and Knowledge Services", "Change and Innovation: Technology-driven Library Transformation and Development", "Mutual Learning and Integration: Win-win Library Exchanges and Cooperation", and "Openness and Mutual Benefit: Multi-participation for Reading". For more information, please visit the conference website meeting.nlc.cn.

This international symposium was broadcast live in two conference rooms in the NLC, where library staff could watch the conference live. Besides, the opening ceremony and keynote speeches were broadcast live on library special website, the NLC official microblog, guangming.com and other online platforms, and the broadcast link was announced on the NLC new media platform.