Multi-Volume Sets Project (MVS) ARCHIVE: History of the MVS Project

Created in 1992, with generous funding from the Japan-United States Friendship Commission, the NCC's Multi-Volume Sets Project (MVS) makes grants for the purchase of expensive multi-volume sets of Japanese language materials that are in demand by users and are not held elsewhere in North America. In the last two decades MVS has created a circulating national collection of Japanese resources numbering more than 42,000 items held in 35 institutions in all regions of the U.S. Since 2010 MVS has allocated 40% of each year’s funds to applications from institutions with annual Japanese language acquisitions budgets of less than $10,000. MVS only funds expensive sets that are generally beyond the budget capacity of an institution. To qualify for consideration by MVS a set must cost at least ¥100,000 and have been published two full years prior to the MVS grant year.