FIRE AID and EASST at Brasilia Global Road Safety Conference
FIRE AID Chair Jim Fitzpatrick MP and Deputy Chair Emma MacLennan played a substantial role in the 2nd Global Road Safety Conference in Brazil from November 16-19th 2015.
FIRE AID Chair Jim Fitzpatrick MP and Deputy Chair Emma MacLennan (also Director of EASST) played a substantial role in the 2nd Global Road Safety Conference in Brazil from November 16-19th 2015. They were joined by FIRE AID and EASST Patron Lord Robertson, EASST partners Chinara Kasmambetova, Poghos Shahinyan, Serghei Diaconu and Tatiana Mihailova, who were all prominent speakers in different Conference events and parallel sessions.
EASST and FIRE AID’s Emma MacLennan at the FIA Foundation Side Event on ‘Child Health and Urban Mobility’
The result of the Conference was the formal adoption of a new ‘Brasilia Declaration on Road Safety’ by conference delegates. The Declaration recommends actions to reduce road casualties by: strengthening road safety management, legislation and enforcement; promoting safer roads and more sustainable transportation; protecting vulnerable road users; developing safer vehicles; increasing awareness and building capacity of road users; improving post-crash response and rehabilitation; and strengthening cooperation and coordination to enhance road safety. The full Declaration can be downloaded here: http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_traffic/Brasilia_Declaration/en/
Emma MacLennan was a speaker at three separate Conference events. At the FIA Foundation Side Event on ‘Child Health and Urban Mobility’ she joined other NGOs working to reduce child mortality, speaking of EASST’s work raising road safety awareness and promoting sustainable mobility. At a Side Event organised by Global NCAP on ‘Towards Zero – Halving Road Deaths by 2020,’ she set out the model employed by EASST and partners to build Safe Villages. Then at an International Road Transport Union Side Event on ‘Crash Avoidance Programmes’ Emma highlighted EASST’s work to improve occupational road safety management including our EASST/Cranfield University training course.
EASST Armenian partner Poghos Shahinyan spoke in a Towards Zero Foundation Side Event launching a new ‘Legislators’ Network for Road Safety.’ The example of Armenia – where the efforts of Poghos and the National Road Safety Council NGO helped to raise road safety high on the political agenda – was an inspiration to other delegates. He was joined by FIRE AID Chair Jim Fitzpatrick MP who will be a founding member of the new network.
At another Parallel Session on ‘Post-Crash Response’ organised by the World Health Organisation Jim Fitzpatrick MP, speaking as FIRE AID Chair, urged delegates to give serious consideration to capacity building for fire & rescue services in order to save more lives. In many countries fatality rates at the scene of a crash are far too high simply due to a lack of equipment, vehicles and training for road crash response. Jim spoke of FIRE AID’s work, receiving a warm reception from the audience and organisers.
The Conference provided a global voice for FIRE AID and stimulated many new partnerships and initiatives that, it is hoped, will come to fruition in the coming months.