Towards greater transparency and information sharing, the World Bank as the vital source of financial and technical assistance to developing countries around the world has opened to the public the free access of its data and documents through their Access to Information (AI) Policy and Open Data initiative. This provides downloadable access to over 7,000 indicators from World Bank the data sets and pre formatted tables.

As part of the initiative, the Ateneo de Naga University –World Bank Knowledge and Development Center in partnership with the Bicol Region Librarians Council had organized a one day seminar workshop on “WB Access to Information and Open Data Catalog”  last August 5, 2011. Speakers for this activity are the two representatives from the World Bank Philippines headed by Mr. Henry Grageda, Knowledge Partnership Focal Person and Mr. Vincent Lobrigo, World Bank Representative. The Participants were the members of the Bicol Region Librarians coming from Sorsogon, Albay, Iriga, Camarines Norte and Camarines Sur. The objective of this program was to train Librarians on how to access data available and disseminate information which may be needed by the researchers or their clients.

The seminar covers orientation and knowledge sharing about the World Bank, the speaker presented information and graphical reports available in the World Bank database and each one of the Librarians got the chance to do the simulation on how the data will be extracted representing a graphical model around the globe with its specific dates and information needed. Also, the oath-taking of the Bicol Region Librarians Council were integrated in the afternoon session followed by the presentation on Library Automation of the representative from Electronic Information Systems Inc.