Her passion and love in working amongst the country’s most vulnerable was felt in her speech during the launch of the PNG FASHION and DESIGN WEEK recently at the National Museum.
Mrs Jean Parkop remains a strong advocate for people with disabilities in Papua New Guinea and used her time during the launch to further highlight PNG’s progress over the years in ensuring basic services are tailored towards the needs of every citizen who is currently disabled.
PNG’s progress was measured against actions taken by countries around the world in providing the best it can towards the needs of people with disabilities and how PNG remains at a snail’s pace in achieving some of these set goals internationally.
“Other countries you will see that public transport has been modified to cater for people with disabilities so people in wheelchairs could be able to go in and travel to their destination, even people with visual impairment could be able to utilize special buttons in these transportation,” she said.
Mrs Parkop highlighted how “adaptive clothing” has also been introduced specifically into the sporting arena internationally for inclusion of PWD’s, including teaching methods in schools have been adjusted to cater for people with disabilities.
She hopes that through this platform, not only will it raise the level of awareness on what we as citizens of the world can do to help in promoting the rights of people with disabilities but also assist in creating clothes that can be comfortably worn by PWD’s.
Mrs Parkop said PNG’s progress in recognizing the needs of PWD’s picked up in 2012 onwards after it performed poorly amongst Asia Pacific countries in earlier years because of the Government’s progress in achieving international goals set out for People with disabilities.
The efforts by Government, according to Mrs Parkop picked up in the areas of funding, education and basic services provided at hotels and Government after 2012, but more needs to be done in the area of inclusion.
“History in PNG shows that we have not done much research into helping people with special needs, but a few studies show, especially our intellectual PLW’s are not visible or out there, due to shame,” said Mrs Parkop.
Mrs Parkop stressed that other countries have involved people with disabilities on their runways and PNG can follow suit, in including the active participation of people with disabilities within our communities.
“There may be challenges ahead in making this runway accessible by people with disabilities, however, the process of removing these barriers need to begin and I commend Mrs Janet SIOS and her team for taking up the courage to begin this process and I know it will go a long way,” added Mrs Parkop.
It is the focus of this platform to ensure the workshops in both Kokopo, Lae and Port Moresby will cater for locals who are able to design “adaptive clothing” that can be comfortably worn by people with disabilities.
The PNG FASHION AND DESIGN WEEK has been able to train at least 200 emerging designers and 150 local models who can be able to sustain themselves following the week through hard work and networking while at the same time, seeking a possible future within the PNG SME Sector.
