Organized by the Ministry of Culture, a panel discussion on the National Plan for the Development of Archival Activity for the period from 2020 to 2025 was held on Friday, 13 December 2019 in the Croatian State Archives.
Presenting the National Plan State Secretary dr. sc. Ivica Poljičak referred to the established objectives, priorities and measures. As key objectives, he highlighted ensuring the prerequisites for the successful performance of archival activity and ensuring the availability and quick access to archival heritage. He added that the need for the drafting of the National Plan arose during the work on the new Law on Archival Materials and Archives, and its purpose is to define the essential needs of archival activity. In this regard, he highlighted the infrastructure assumptions and capacities, the availability of material and the establishment of a digital archive, the development and quality of the service provided to users.
National plan for the development of archival activities creates the preconditions for the construction of contemporary archival activity in Croatia in the context of the challenges of the 21st century. It will enable the transformation of the archival service into a modern public service and the full availability and use of archival material and information about it regardless of the form in which the material was created or the place where it is kept. At the same time, as the main strategic document in the field of archival activities, it will serve as a basis for planning a complete financial perspective for the next decade and the preparation and implementation of EU projects. The national plan for the development of archival activity is divided into two fundamental parts. In the first part, an analysis of the current situation in archival activity is made on the basis of a questionnaire filled in by all state archives, in which the basic elements of the achieved level of development are singled out. The second part contains the set key strategic objectives and the way of their achievement, as well as a plan of activities that concretizes the measures and activities for their achievement in the next period.
The analysis of the current situation provided an insight into the real state of the archival service and allowed to focus on two main goals: ensuring the prerequisites for the successful performance of archival activities and ensuring the availability and rapid access to archival material.
The first objective is focused on the infrastructural prerequisites for the performance of archival activities, which include the provision of space for the long-term preservation of material, regardless of its form and media, space for public service archives, the provision of equipment for the preservation of material in analogue form and the necessary IK technology that will ensure the smooth transformation of the material into a digital form and its online use, and create the prerequisites for downloading digital and digitized content and their storage through the Shared Services Centre. The second goal is aimed at ensuring the availability of archival material from its creation and the possibility of its use for different purposes and in different contexts. The new archival legislation has established such a legal framework, which will, in addition to ensuring the regular downloading of archival material into the archives and increasing the degree of ordering of archives, affect its availability. Also, the possibility of converting archival material into digital form is a powerful contribution to increasing its visibility, enabling re-use and the creation of new services, and the further development of the archival information system and the inclusion of state archives in the Central System of the Digital Cultural Heritage will ensure network access to the material and its data.
Ensuring accessibility also applies to the material which is the subject of Annex D to the Agreement on Succession Issues. In this sense, one of the measures relates to the intensification of activities in the completion of the succession process of archival material located in the state archives of the former SFRY, the continuous recording of this material and the provision of online access to information about it to all interested users.
Director of the Croatian State Archives dr. sc. Dinko Čutura spoke about the succession of archival material in the light of ensuring the availability of material and information about it, and the deputy director dr. sc. Jozo Ivanović on archival material in the digital environment with a review of the availability of material.
The President of the Croatian Archival Council Darko Rubčić spoke about the role of archivists and the archival service in the implementation of the Plan, and the Head of the Archives and Digitalisation Sector Ivana Prgin spoke about the management of documentary material outside the archives. The moderator of the panel discussion was the president of the Croatian Archival Society dr. sc. Sylvia Babic.
The National Plan for the Development of Archival Activities shall be implemented in accordance with the obligation laid down in the Archives and Archives Act, adopted by the Government of the Republic of Croatia at its session held on 14 November 2019.
Taken from: https://www.min-kulture.hr/default.aspx?id=23792 (16.12.2019)
