ZAGREB, March 15, 2020 – Over 1,300 cultural workers, most of whom are freelancers or independent authors in creative industries have to date signed an appeal for urgent assistance which they need to overcome the current situation caused by the outbreak of coronavirus.
Concerts and other cultural events are continually being cancelled or postponed in the country due to the outbreak of the virus, and such developments affect creative industries, notably freelancers and precariously employed professionals in that sector.
The appeal emphasises that in addition to a public health risk due to the spread of coronavirus, independent cultural workers are losing their livelihoods in the current situation.
The signatories also warn that although the situation concerning the public health can go back to normal until the end of April, the crisis in this cultural sector is likely to last until the autumn.
An additional problem is that a part of the sector has not yet recovered from the consequences of the teachers’ strike in schools last autumn, when the distribution of contents for school children was also impossible, reads the appeal.
The signatories support a pan-European appeal for establishment of a fund for assistance to individual artists and art organisations in a bid to overcome this period marked by bans on public gatherings and cancellations of events.
Culture Minister Nina Obuljen Koržinek has already promised that she will see to it that the government’s measures to prop up businesses also include assistance for artists and creative industries to pass through this period as less painfully as possible.
More coronavirus news can be found in the Lifestyle section.
