Abstract:
The type of content and file format influences the success of digital preservation strategies.
Institutional repositories are custodians of digital resources that are to be held in perpetuity
necessitating the need to consider long term preservation of these resources. The purpose of this
study was to evaluate the suitability of digital content and its metadata for long term digital
preservation. The study was qualitative in nature utilizing interviews as well as document
analysis. websites and IR database investigations were utilized to check on content, format and
metadata adequacy. The findings revealed great inadequacies in the IRs’ capabilities to support
long term preservation as evidenced by haphazard content and format selection, ingest
procedures that did not consider long-term preservation as well as metadata that focused on
access only. Recommendations included the need to involve archivist in develop selection and
appraisal policies as well as development comprehensive metadata policies that ensured that
preservation metadata was also captured as required. Creation of awareness among repository
administrators to expose them to the importance of adopting open file formats and standard as
well as benchmarking were also proposed. The paper provides insights into universities on the
relationship between selection and processing of digital resources and their long-term
preservation within the IRs in Kenya
