Following independence from France in 1960, Mali began a major program of educational reform. Specialized schools of higher education were established, the first of which were the National School of Engineering (ENI); the Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENSup) for the training of high school teachers and other professionals; the National School of Administration (ENA); the School of Medicine and Pharmacy; and the Rural Polytechnic Institute (IPR).

These specialized schools today fall under the University of Mali (UM), which enrolls around 25,000 students in the country’s capital city, Bamako. The UM and its constituent institutions are the country’s only higher educational bodies created since independence. With faculty in the mid-500s, the student to faculty ratio is currently around 40:1.

Today the UM is organized around three main structural categories – its major schools, its faculties and its institutes.

Major schools currently include the ENSup, ENA, and the School of Medicine and Pharmacy. More recent additions include the ENI and the Center of the Creation of Mali’s Telecommunications.

Faculties number Letters, Arts and Social Sciences; Science and Technology; the specialized Medicine, Pharmacy and Dentistry; andJuridical and Economic Sciences.

Finally, there are four institutes: the Institute of Basic Sciences and Applied Research; the Institute of Management; the Institute of Technology; andthe IPR

The beneficiary library is in the Faculty of Medicine, Pharmacy and Dentistry. It is the largest biomedical library in Barnako. The collection includes 10,000 books and 120 journals. It is used by more than 5,000 students, as well as members of the different medical professions.

Country fact file
11.8m people live in Mali. Per capita income is estimated at $900, with 64% living below the poverty line – 30% of those in urban areas, 70% in rural. Literacy is at 46%.