SIDALC is an international online information service in which institutions from 23 countries in the Americas share their agricultural, livestock, forestry and environmental information. Created in 1999 with the leadership of our Orton Memorial Library, today SIDALC is one of the most important sources of knowledge and information for agriculture in LAC.

SIDALC ’s success lies in the fact that it has taken advantage of the intellectual capital of 159 national institutions and 12 national networks that, acting as intermediaries in the management  and dissemination of information, continually expand and modernize their services in light of the new paradigms of the “knowledge society”.

Because of this, SIDALC is the largest community of information specialists interested in providing services openly around the globe. They collaborate with one another, “sharing a little so that all can have more,” while conserving their identity and policies.

The Alliance provides access to information generated throughout the hemisphere and stored in libraries and other related information centers. Its database AGRI2000 contains some 2.4 million reference materials, including: books, journals, theses and reports.

At present, SIDALC is open to the public, at www.sidalc.net (no subscription required), permitting online searches of available digital collections, including more than 160,000 full-text documents.  Furthermore, SIDALC is linked to other information systems and networks in a number of countries of the Americas, which provides stakeholders in agriculture and rural territories with a direct response to their information needs from reference desks around LAC.