The Otago faculty initially sent about 50 law books and journals to the Gambia, in West Africa, in early 2010, to help develop the library at the University of the Gambia's new law school.
The Dunedin initiative came after Prof Kim Economides, who had been appointed director of the Otago faculty's recently established Legal Issues Centre in 2009, visited the Gambia as a "special guest of honour" of the Gambia Bar Association early in 2010.
Previously a professor of legal ethics at Exeter University in England, Prof Economides had visited the Gambia as part of a UK-funded project to strengthen legal capacity in the small country.
He had been "quite shocked" by the limited resources initially available at the Gambian law library, and arranged for the books to be gathered and sent over, with strong support from the Otago Faculty, and backing from some other Otago lawyers.
Prof Economides was "very pleased" the Otago initiative had proved a catalyst for "further significant donations from the US and elsewhere".
He had approached several leading international law publishers, both in the UK and in New Zealand, and they had subsequently provided many new law text books for use by the Gambian library.
And the US-based Books for Africa organisation this year provided 500 text books, valued about $US50,000, after learning about the Otago initiative, via a news story on the internet.
"It's very good that people here in New Zealand can make a difference in other parts of the world, through their generosity," Prof Economides said.
The gifts were helping Gambians help themselves, had "made a big difference to them" and would be of "lasting benefit".
Dr Aboubacar Senghore, interim dean of the Gambian Law Faculty, recently told Prof Economides, by email, that the shipment of US books had arrived.
The University of Gambia was "deeply indebted and sincerely grateful" for the help of Prof Economides and that of Lane Ayres, of Books for Africa, Dr Senghore said.
