Legal Deposit

What is a Legal Deposit?

In Uganda, The National Library Act 2003 states that “Every publisher of a book or document in Uganda, at his/her cost to deposit three copies of the book or document or one copy of the video gram or film and ten copies in the case of any government departments with the National Library." This is what is referred to as legal deposit.The main goal of legal deposits is to preserve Uganda's Documented Heritage. 

Currently, Uganda has three Legal Deposit Laws in force namely: The National Library Act, 2003; The Deposit Library and Documentation Center Act, 1969; and the Makerere University College ( Deposit Library) Act, 1964.

Uganda has three legal deposit centers, namely:

    National Library of Uganda
    Uganda Management Institute
    Makerere University Library

Items to be Deposited with the National Library are --

Books and documents that are published in Uganda and made available to the public as -- documents of paper  like medium, microform, and photographs, Sound fixations, films, video grams, electronic documents, and a combination of them; and Books and documents produced outside Uganda for Ugandan publishers or specially adapted to the public in Uganda and imported into Uganda.

Persons Obliged to Deposit

    A publisher or producer of a document in Uganda;
    A Ugandan producer or publisher who publishes or produces a book or document outside Uganda but imports it into Uganda.

The National Bibliography of Uganda:

The legal deposits facilitate in the compilation of the National Bibliography of Uganda, which is a record of the collection published in any given year, as a means of promoting awareness of the availability of these books and encouraging the sale of these books in the Country and abroad.