LocationsBy Ashekur Rahman, Head of Poverty and Urbanization, UNDP Bangladesh
Someone in the world dies from a road accident every 24 seconds, World Health Organization (WHO) found. Road crashes take 1.35 million lives on average every year, injuring 50 million more. The scale constitutes a public health crisis, according to WHO. Globally, traffic injuries are also a common cause of death for young people aged between 5 and 29 years. And more than 90% of fatalities take place in low- and middle-income countries.
Take Bangladesh’s deadly roads. In 2019, road crashes saw 5227 deaths and caused nearly 7000 injuries. Nearly 300,000 unfit vehicles were running on the roads according to Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA). Other factors include careless commuters, unskilled drivers, poor law enforcement and weak traffic management.
Bangladesh sets high, achievable ambition
Experts say road traffic crashes are preventable. And Bangladesh is working to make roads safe.On 22 October, Bangladesh will observe ‘Road Safety Day’ themed ‘Jiboner Agey Jibika Noy, Sarak Durghatana Ar Noy’. The Honorable Prime Minister reiterated the need for following traffic rules to ensure road safety on the same occasion last year.
More importantly, Bangladesh is committed to cutting down road accidents by 50% as part of the UN Global Plan for the Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011–2020. The Plan has adopted five plan pillars (road safety management, safer roads and mobility, safer vehicles, safer road users and post-crash response) to support countries design sustainable road safety framework; Bangladesh is working in line with the Plan to reform its road safety sector. The Bangladesh High Court has directed concerned authorities to not allow unfit vehicles to run on roads. The country has enacted the Road Transport Act (RTA) to cover road safety issues with severe penalty as punishment. The updated (2017-2020) National Road Safety Action Plan (NRSAP) has identified 9 key themes on road safety issues and has adopted the vision of reducing 50% of road crash fatalities. Moreover, the country is setting up a road safety authority and fund under the National Road Safety Council (NRSC) to lead efforts, collect relevant data and monitor and evaluate road safety activities across Bangladesh.
A multi-stakeholder approach is vital for achieving global goals
While Bangladesh has made a good start, the world has seen little progress towards halving the number of deaths from road crashes by 2020 in line with the Sustainable Development Goals. Research highlights that the total number of deaths has plateaued despite sporadic success in some countries. It underscores the need to do more at the country level in terms of training people on setting up, delivering, monitoring and evaluating an effective road safety system. And there’s greater need for solid evidence on what works in low-resource settings.
The World Bank estimates investment of USD 7.8 billion over the coming decade to achieve SDG Targets 3.6 (3: Good Health and Well-being) and 11.2 (11: Sustainable Cities and Communities) that call for halving the number of global road deaths and providing universal access to safe transport in cities and settlements. This calls for scaling up interventions and investments to achieve the targets. Building on Bangladesh’s promising initiatives, the country carries the potential to achieve targets if relevant partners work together. On a good note, the UN system and World Bank are starting to work together in Bangladesh to support the country to improve road safety performance.
