UN Summit sets the stage for ‘Tag’ launch 

Launch of the tag at the MDG Summit, UN. (l-r) UNEP Director Achim Steiner, Michelle Yeoh, IDB President Alberto Moreno, UN Ambassador for Oman Fuad Al Hinai

For the first time, road safety hit the agenda of a high level UN development summit when the ‘road safety Tag’ was unveiled by senior UN officials and leaders from multilateral development institutions at UN headquarters in New York.

Make Roads Safe global ambassador Michelle Yeoh and UN development advisor Dr. Kevin Watkins took leading roles at the UN Millennium Development Goal Summit event. They were joined by UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner, Inter-American Development Bank President Alberto Moreno, World Bank Vice President Inger Andersen, Minister of State of Moldova Victor Bodiu and Oman’s Ambassador to the UN, H.E. Fuad Al Hinai.

The event titled ‘safe and sustainable roads for the MDGs’ was chaired by David Ward, Director General of the FIA Foundation and co-sponsored by the UN Environment Programme and the Government of Oman.

After photo call to launch the Tag, Dr. Watkins, currently a Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the Global Economic Governance Programme at Oxford University, presented his report on road safety and the Millennium Development Goals.

The report, commissioned by the FIA Foundation, was trailed by the press in the build up to the summit. It warns that road deaths are hindering the international community’s work towards the MDGs placing a huge burden on developing countries. It highlights that while the world rightly concentrates on reaching MDG targets such as saving the lives of children under five, hundreds of thousands of children over five are killed or seriously injured on developing countries’ roads each year.

'The Missing Link - road traffic injuries and the Millennium Development Goals' reveals that while 3,500 people are killed every day on the world’s roads, developing countries account for 3,000 of these deaths. By 2020, this figure is forecast to rise to 5,700 a day. Road crashes already kill more children than Malaria, over the next five years they are predicted to become the biggest killer of children aged 5-14, the report says.

Dr. Watkins said: “It is a question of changing the mindset. We must not turn our back on this epidemic that poses one of the greatest threats to public health. The international community rarely turns its attention to the global road deaths crisis but at this UN Summit launch, we have the chance to highlight the need for urgent action.”

Speaking to the media following the Summit event, Michelle Yeoh said: "It is important that from almost nowhere, maybe even 10 years ago that it wasn't discussed, that today we're here at the United Nations, We're able to launch this 'decade of action' symbol. We want people to wear it, to believe in it, because this will remind you that action needs to be done, every day. It should be part of our lives."

Both the Inter-American Development Bank President Alberto Moreno and Minister of State of Moldova Victor Bodiu issued responses to the report at the event. Also attending the event were representatives from international donors, development NGOs and national governments.