Road safety seminar to highlight Asian road safety innovation
More than 150 leading road safety experts, practitioners, business representatives and government officials from around the world will gather in Siem Reap, Cambodia, on 3-5 November for the Global Road Safety Partnership’s (GRSP) Asia Road Safety Seminar. This is a key regional event in which participants will share strategies for reducing road-crash related injury and discuss the implementation of the United Nations’ Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020.
Held last year in Singapore, this year’s event is being run with the support of the Government of Cambodia through its National Road Safety Committee (NRSC).
“Asia has a critical role to play in addressing the road safety crisis,” said Andrew Pearce, CEO of GRSP. “A region with diverse cultures, growing economies and rapid motorization, Asia is at the front-line of the road safety crisis, suffers heavily from a crisis that claims 1.3 million lives worldwide annually.”
“Fortunately, Asia has also become a hotbed for road safety innovation, where best practices have proven to make a difference in changing behaviour and reducing road crash related death and injury,” he added. “Those attending the seminar will hear about numerous cases in which multi-sector road safety interventions in Asia have provided proven, life-saving results and inspired other efforts around the world.”
Some of the road safety interventions to be featured include:
• Programmes to promote helmet use in Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam that have led to quantifiable increases in helmet wearing, and in the case of Cambodia and Vietnam, they resulted in clear reductions in motorcycle related death and injury.
• Road infrastructure projects in Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam, Korea and Bangladesh using the latest technology to identify safety issues and design road improvements.
• Updates on projects in China that have improved safety pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists.
Participants will also learn about and discuss:
• Updates on the world’s largest donation to global road safety to date, the Bloomberg Philanthropies funded US$125 million RS10 project that targets 10 countries including Cambodia.
• Updates on the region’s participation in the Global Road Safety Initiative (GRSI), the world’s largest private sector collaboration for road safety.
• Discussions on how Asia can best prepare for the United Nations’ Decade of Action for Road Safety, which offers an opportunity to increase political commitment, funding and global visibility for one of the world’s leading health crises.
• The role of youth in the Decade of Action for Road Safety.
• The Asian Development Bank’s Sustainable Transport Initiative.
The GRSP Asia Road Safety Seminar has become a key platform for developing effective responses to this global, man-made humanitarian crisis. Each year, 1.3 million people are killed on the world’s roads and 90 per cent of these fatalities are in developing countries. This death toll is set to rise dramatically over the next decade unless action is taken. In March this year, the United Nations passed a resolution calling for a Decade of Action for Road Safety in 2011-2020.
His Excellency Mr Tram Iv Tek, Minister for Public Works and Transport and Chairman of the NRSC will open the seminar on Wednesday 3 November. The seminar will continue on Thursday 4 November, and be followed by an International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP) workshop to be held on Friday 5 November.
The theme of the GRSP Asia Seminar 2010 in Siem Reap is Preparing for the Decade of Action. This will focus on ensuring that the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety is effective as a means of reducing road trauma in the region. The seminar’s key objectives this year are to:
• stimulate planning for the Decade of Action
• develop networks to support information, good practice and knowledge sharing
• update representatives on global, regional and country developments
• review progress on implementation of key initiatives in the region, including iRAP and the Good Practice Manuals
• highlight key road safety issues for countries in Asia, with a focus on children and youth.
The seminar has been supported over the years by GRSP through its corporately funded Global Road Safety Initiative (GRSI) programme, with funds provided by Ford, General Motors, Honda, Michelin, Renault, Shell and Toyota.
This year’s event is also supported by the International Road Assessment Program (iRAP), FIA Foundation, Asian Development Bank, and Western Pacific Regional Office of the World Health Organisation (WHO).
GRSP is a global partnership between business, civil society and governmental organizations collaborating to improve road safety conditions around the world. It was initiated by the World Bank Group in 1999, and is a hosted program of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). GRSP undertakes a range of activities in low and middle income countries worldwide, ranging from program delivery and demonstration projects to capacity building and advocacy.
