Road Safety Kyrgyzstan highlight the importance of keeping children safe on the roads
Kyrgyzstan Traffic Police record around 700-800 thousand traffic law violations each year. Data comparing the number of violations in the first five months of 2016 with the equivalent period in 2017 shows that this figure has increased by approximately 140,000 instances in this short space of time.
The promotion of safe driving and prevention of traffic violations was therefore a key theme at this year’s National Conference on Traffic Safety organised by Kyrgyzstan’s Ministry of Transport with support of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) on the 5th July.
During the conference a wide and varied discussion on road safety and preventative measures took place involving government representatives and national and international road safety experts, including EASST partner Chinara Kasmambetova, Director of Road Safety Kyrgyzstan.
Chinara presented specifically on Road Safety Kyrgyzstan’s work in teaching children the importance of keeping safe on the roads through projects carried out in 2016 and 2017 using the EASST Road Safety Education Pack.
The ability to tailor the Education Pack to local contexts has provided an ideal opportunity for children to learn basic road safety principles in an environment that is familiar and relevant to them through age-appropriate activities such as painting, storytelling and interactive games.
A representative from the World Bank praised Road Safety Kyrgyzstan saying that their work was making more of an impact “than all other structures represented at the conference put together”.
Representatives from the National Red Crescent Society and ADB both expressed an interest in using the Education Pack within their road safety projects. While representatives from several universities took examples of the Pack away with them with a view to training their students in how to better teach road safety lessons to kids.
To date, the Education Pack has been used to teach over 200 children aged 6-14 years old the importance of road safety and basic skills in how to keep safe. Read more about the implementation of the pack in Bishkek here.
