Exploring the Impediments to Digitization and Digital Preservation of Cultural Heritage Resources: A Selective Review

Abstract This paper presents a careful review of studies underlining the impediments in digitization and digital preservation of cultural heritage resources faced by library professionals, archivists and project managers in digitization projects. A systematic and structured literature review based on the conceptual and empirical published studies on digitization and digital preservation is done to sieve out the barriers and challenges of digitization projects. The findings of the study revealed that most digitization projects suffer with impediments such as, inadequate funding, lack of national-level digital preservation policy and absence of technical infrastructure while digitizing and preserving the cultural and heritage resources. The originality of the paper lies in presenting the prominent constraints in digitization and preservation of cultural and heritage resources in consolidated manner otherwise scattered in several case studies. The findings will be of high significance for librarians and digitization project managers at the planning stage of their digitation projects.