diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index ba4994998c..eadb196414 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -8,6 +8,7 @@ doc/api.xml
 doc/api.html
 doc/changelog.html
 doc/node.1
+tools/nodejs.pc
 test/fixtures/hello.txt
 tmp/
 node
diff --git a/tools/nodejs.pc.in b/tools/nodejs.pc.in
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..aa9cefc610
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tools/nodejs.pc.in
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+version=@VERSION@
+prefix=@PREFIX@
+libdir=${prefix}/lib
+includedir=${prefix}/include/node
+
+Name: nodejs
+Description: Evented I/O for V8 JavaScript.
+Version: ${version}
+Cflags: -I${includedir}
diff --git a/wscript b/wscript
index a07fd2df06..c027ed3ff0 100644
--- a/wscript
+++ b/wscript
@@ -530,6 +530,7 @@ def build(bld):
         , 'CPPFLAGS'  : " ".join(program.env["CPPFLAGS"]).replace('"', '\\"')
         , 'LIBFLAGS'  : " ".join(program.env["LIBFLAGS"]).replace('"', '\\"')
         , 'PREFIX'    : program.env["PREFIX"]
+        , 'VERSION'   : '0.3.0-pre' # FIXME should not be hard-coded, see NODE_VERSION_STRING in src/node_version.h
         }
     return x
 
@@ -571,6 +572,14 @@ def build(bld):
   bld.install_files('${PREFIX}/lib/node/wafadmin', 'tools/wafadmin/*.py')
   bld.install_files('${PREFIX}/lib/node/wafadmin/Tools', 'tools/wafadmin/Tools/*.py')
 
+  # create a pkg-config(1) file
+  node_conf = bld.new_task_gen('subst', before="cxx")
+  node_conf.source = 'tools/nodejs.pc.in'
+  node_conf.target = 'tools/nodejs.pc'
+  node_conf.dict = subflags(node)
+
+  bld.install_files('${PREFIX}/lib/pkgconfig', 'tools/nodejs.pc')
+
 def shutdown():
   Options.options.debug
   # HACK to get binding.node out of build directory.