April 8th Opening Ceremony Summary
This blog post is a summary of what has been said and done during the Ceremonial Opening of the Youth Parliament 2025. Below you can find everything that has been discussed.
The ceremonial opening has taken place at the Bjelovarsko-bilogorska zupanija, or translated into English: the “Bjelovar-Bilogora County hall”
The Ceremonial Opening has started with the headmaster (dalibor vukalovic) taking word and introducing all the important members of the Youth Parliament, such as Ronny Thill (AEHT Secretary) and Korina (former Youth Parliament President).
After the introductions, Duncan S., the current Youth Parliament President, has been shown on the presentation beamer on video. Due to complications with school, he wasn’t able to make it tot his event.
Ronny Thill, the AEHT secretary, also has given a speech. He has thanked all the people who helped organize the event. Ronny Thill also finds the topic for this years Youth Parliament well found, as it discusses subjects/issues found in many cases in many countries. These topics center around the subjects of rural and tourism bringing life to local communities.
After Ronny Thill’s speech was over, the presentation would delve deeper into the themes of the Youth Parliament. At first, they discussed the SWOT* analyses every school/country had to submit before arriving at Bjelovar, to talk about the debate subjects being apparent in their own countries.
Luxembourg, Spain, Croatia, France, Latvia, Netherlands, Italy, Mala, Portugal and Hungary all had to submit a SWOT analyse. The presentator has taken out most important details out of their SWOT analyses and placed them in a summary. Eventually there was also a final summary, which are all analyses combined, so the most important details that can be found back in most countries. This is the following result:
Strengths
- Rich cultural heritage
- Undiscovered sights
- Array of gastro, active and other offers
Weaknesses
- Lack of infratructure
- Bad visibility
- Competition
- Problems with mass tourism and seasonality
Opportunities
- Health and rural tourism emerging as trendy
- Collaborations with the locals
- Opportunity for new content and activities to be added
Threats
- Climate changes
- Mass tourism leading to deteriation of destination
- Rising living costs
After the SWOT analyses, Marcel Marek, the director of the Tourist Community of the Bjelovar-Bilogora county, talked about the strategic documents of the Bjelovar-Bilogora county, and how the Bjelovar-Bilogora county is the beating heart of Croatia. With the key tourism products, such as natural attractions, health tourism, hiking, bicycle touring, cavalry tourism, cultural heritage and flavors of tradition.
The director then proceeds to mention 5 reasons why to visit the Bjelovar&Moslavina&Papuk destination:
- The Natura 2000 Visitor Center, Pollovlje
- Cazma Natura Project: Take a walk along the green paths and swim in the first biological pool in Croatia
- Romany house – A house that breaks prejudices
- Mato Lovrak cultural center, which is a return to childhood
- Jankovic castle – Thre treasure of the city of Daruvar
He also mentioned that there will be a new tourism identity: A new destination name -The visual identitiy of the Bjelovar & Moslavina & Papuk Tourist destination cluster.
A new destination slogan – DOZIVLJAJ VISE (EXPERIENCE MORE) A new website – https://visitbjelovarbilogoracounty.com/
There are some tourism projects work in progress in the Bjelovar-Bilogora county, to make the county more attractable/enjoyable by tourists, such as:
- Terme Bjelovar – A Green field destination in Bjelovar with pools.
- Daruavar Spa – A reconstruction of the oldest spa in Croatia.
- Villa Garic – The center for hunting tourism in the county. This is a hotel with 140 beds with all sorts of facilities around.
- Bicycle path along the old Railway – There is a railway connecting the towns, the Railway will be rebuilt with a road for bicycling as its the spine of rural tourism in the country.
After the director had finished his part of the presentation, Nikolina Jakopić, Head of the Sector for the Development of Tourist Destinations from the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, gave a presentation about the history, but also current developments in many projects active in the county and how joining the EU has helped the county develop a lot in the tourism areas.
After the presentation of Nikolina Jakopić had been finsihed, the end of the ceremonial opening has arrived. The teachers/mentors left for the hotel, while the student participants stayed for a little longer for the student briefing. The student briefing can be found in the blog post designated for this.
*SWOT-analyse = Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats analyse
