TRANSFORMING LIBRARIANSHIP AND INFORMATION SERVICE DELIVERY IN THE 5TH INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION THROUGH INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY: A CASE STUDY OF DONALD EKONG LIBRARY, UNIVERSITY OF PORT HARCOURT

The advent of the 5th Industrial Revolution (IR) marks a paradigm shift in the integration of human-centric and advanced technological innovations across various domains, including librarianship and information service delivery. This study investigated how innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and other modern technologies is reshaping libraries and information services. The descriptive survey design was used for the study. The population of the study consists of 22 librarians and 18 library officers in the Donald Ekong Library University of Port Harcourt. The population size was 40 therefore, census sampling technique was used for the study. Instrument for data collection was a four Likert scale self-structured questionnaire while the data collected was analysed using mean and standard deviation.The findings of the study revealed among others, a high extent of availability and application of innovative technologies, which is a positive indicator for the development of library services in the country. It also showed that innovative technologies are applied to a high extent in library service delivery in Nigerian university libraries. The study recommended among others that Donald Ekong Library should seek more substantial funding and investment to acquire, maintain, and upgrade technological tools. Donald Ekong Library should implement regular and comprehensive training programs for library staff to ensure that, they have the technical skills to operate and manage new technologies effectively. Keywords: Industrial Revolution, innovative technology, librarianship transformation, information service delivery, artificial intelligence.