It was a great honour to host the Croatian Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, which has presented the final activities of the Nature for All in Sign Language project on the 15^th of May. The leader of the project, which was granted funding by the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, selected all Croatian national parks as associated partners. Members of the Karlovac County Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing also participated in the final conference because there is currently no association for people with this type of disability in the Lika-Senj County.

The project mainly aimed to create content in the form of videos recorded by the Croatian Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, with all the special features of the protected areas interpreted into Croatian Sign Language and International Sign. This task was not easy due to the complexity of some concepts, which the translators tried to simplify while retaining the facts and meaning. Also, the project was done in collaboration with the Association of Employers in Croatian Hospitality, with workshops being held for tourism workers during the project.

The final conference gave us the opportunity to learn more about how we can communicate with the deaf and hard of hearing (no yelling!), how challenging lip reading is (the deaf and hard of hearing understand only about 30% of the content), as well as trying to understand sign language and certain phrases.

In the coming period, stickers with a QR code will be placed at the main entrances to Plitvice Lakes National Park and other locations, giving the deaf and hard of hearing access to videos with content about the national park, i.e. tour programs and natural features. 32 videos are available in Croatian Sign Language and 17 in International Sign, with subtitles for every video.

Objava The final conference of the “Nature for All in Sign Language” project pojavila se prvi puta na Nacionalni park "Plitvička jezera".

The main activity of this project is the creation of accessible content about the individual national parks in Croatian sign language and international sign language through designed video presentations in sign language and with subtitles in Croatian and English. The information that the national park wishes to interpret for deaf and hard of hearing visitors is highlighted via QR codes or even included in applications if the protected area already has them. Such codes are placed on information boards and information desks depending on the protected area.

To ensure that tourism staff, who are the first point of contact for visitors from different parts of Croatia and from all over the world, know how to approach deaf and hard of hearing visitors, the Croatian Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing will organise workshops to train staff on how to communicate with deaf and hard of hearing people. Concrete examples from practise will illustrate the situation of deaf and hard of hearing people in a hearing environment and thus develop awareness of the accessibility of the environment.

The accessibility of communication for deaf and hard of hearing people is very important and is achieved through Croatian sign language and subtitles. According to the World Federation of the Deaf, there are about 200 sign languages in the world, and it would be impossible to provide content in all sign languages. Therefore, the project will incorporate international sign communication as a system of signs collected from different national sign languages.

This extremely valuable project will make it possible to make national parks in the Republic of Croatia more accessible to deaf and hard of hearing visitors so that they can equally experience the natural and cultural values that the protected areas offer. Accessibility is one of the principles of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which ensures that persons with disabilities can live independently of the assistance of others and participate fully in all aspects of life.

Objava Cooperation on the project „Nature for All in Sign Language“ pojavila se prvi puta na Nacionalni park "Plitvička jezera".