Raising road safety awareness for children in Moldova
This year EASST partners the Automobile Club of Moldova along with the National Patrolling Inspectorate worked with the organisers of Moldova’s World Breastfeeding Week to offer additional health-related advice to new parents around the importance of keeping their children safe on the road.
The event was a good opportunity to inform parents about the ACM’s new online car seat donation platform baby4baby.org and how they can donate or benefit from the scheme.
Child car restraints are a vital protection for child passengers. The probability of a child being injured in a crash or sudden stop is reduced by around 70% when an appropriate child restraint is used. However, in many low and middle-income countries the cost of child restraints means they are not an option for many families. Baby4baby.org therefore aims to provide low-income families with adequate car seats and child restraints for their children through donating and sharing them across Moldova.
In addition to learning about the scheme, parents were shown videos about the use of child restraint systems, including advice on current legislation and how to improve safety for children on the roads more generally. Parents were then given the opportunity to discuss and ask questions about the type of car restraints they need and how they can keep their children safe on the roads as pedestrians and cyclists.
As well as working with parents, the ACM also facilitated a number of road safety activities for children including painting, puzzles, and organised a special contest using a mock traffic playground and offered them prizes such as reflective stickers, t-shirts, copybooks and pencils.
Road safety is vital for children and young people and parents play a vital role in making sure their children are shown good examples and learn basic safety skills. Making young people aware of the risks and providing them with strategies to remain safe are important parts of their development.
The baby4baby.org web-donation platform is a collaboration between EASST partners and FIA Clubs the Automobile Club of Moldova and the Belarusian Auto Moto Touring Club financed by the FIA and FIA Foundation within the FIA Road Safety Programme and FIA Action for Road Safety and supported by the Moldovan Parliament, EASST, National Patrolling Inspectorate, Mama.md, Suntparinte.md, “Oratorul” Theatre, Ministry of Education, Autoblog.md and Members of the National Road Safety Council.
The World Breastfeeding Week 2018 activities in Moldova were organized by the ‘Mamica Alapteaza’ and Mama.md portal in partnership with local partners: Automobile Club of Moldova, BB Cream, Ушастый Нянь, OM Kids, Mam & Me, B’Sweet, Smart Start Kids Academy, Irina Spinei Photography, Equilibra Moldova, etc.
