In April of 2006, Mr. Xiao Dehong, University Librarian of Xiamen University, visited University of Washington and attended the second Global U8 Building Administrative Capacity Committee Meeting in Seattle. He met with Dr. Oren Weinberg, University Librarian of Haifa University, and talked about the scarcity and gaps of foreign language collections in XMU. Dr. Oren Weinberg generously agreed to share the duplicated collections owned by University of Haifa. Later in the same year, 500 carton materials were shipped from Port of Haifa, via New York to Qingdao, and finally arrived at XMU. The route was designated by "Books-for-China Project" which was founded by Mr. John Tajen Ma in 2006.
In April of 2007, Mr. Xiao visited the Younes & Soraya Nazarian Library during his stay in the University of Haifa for the third Global U8 BACC Meeting. More further, meaningful discussions were held and the cooperation of duplicates donation project between two libraries became a routine issue. Another 236 cartons of materials sending from University of Haifa arrived in XMU that year through Mr. John Tajen Ma´s route.
In late 2008, Xiamen University Libraries was accredited as the Transfer Station of "Books-for-China Project" by the Ministry of Education of China, with its main responsibility of receiving and distributing donated materials from overseas. In 2009, 250 cartons of books were received by XMU from University of Haifa through the same route mentioned before.
In 2010, Ms. Cecilia Harel, head librarian of Foreign Acquisitions & Collection Development in University of Haifa made a special visit to Xiamen after attending a conference in Shanghai. Ms. Ivy Yang, head librarian of ILL/DD in XMU, showed her around collections in main library and Special Donation Shelves in Zhangzhou Campus. Mr. Xiao invited Ms. Cecilia to the site of Xiang´an Campus and articulated the vision of Xiang´an Campus with her.
Xiamen University Libraries have received nearly 5,000 cartons of materials from University of Haifa in the past eight years, even though Dr. Weinberg left and was promoted to be the director of the National Library of Israel in 2010. Another 1,600 cartons of cataloging tools and books were delivered directly from Haifa to the port of Xiamen in 2010, and arrived smoothly even though it was first time for the route. 2,940 cartons of bound journals were received in 2011 and 2012. The recent 153 cartons of materials arrived in April of 2014, sending from University of Haifa and Bernard G. Segal Law Library of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
These donations greatly enrich our academic collections, and enhanced the bilateral friendship between two sister libraries. We greatly appreciate and acknowledge the endeavors of librarians of University of Haifa, and Ms. Lorraine Epand, director of Bernard G. Segal Law Library of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and contributions of all volunteers from domestic and abroad. Those materials are shelved on the sixth floor of Xiang´an Campus as the first present for the opening ceremony on May 6, 2014.
