Road traffic accidents are the eighth leading cause of death globally and they are the greatest cause of death among young people aged 15 to 29 years. Perhaps even more shocking, nearly 3500 people die in road accidents around the world each day; that is nearly 1.3 million personal tragedies a year. The grim reality is that the death toll is on the increase, particularly in low- and middle-income countries like Guyana.
Without action to reverse this trend, experts project that fatalities from road crashes will reach 1.9 million per year by this year, and millions more will suffer non-fatal injuries. Fortunately, we can now look forward to a major breakthrough in the realm of traffic safety with this relatively new management system standard on road traffic safety published in 2012 by the International Organisation for Standardisation. This standard, ISO 39001: 2012 Road Traffic Safety (RTS) Management Systems – Requirements with guidance for use, experts believe will play an important role in reversing the trend.
ISO 39001:2012 specifies requirements for a Road Traffic Safety (RTS) Management System to enable an organisation that interacts with the road traffic system to reduce death and serious injuries related to road traffic crashes, which it can influence. The requirements of the standard include the development and implementation of an appropriate RTS policy, development of RTS objectives and action plans, which take into account legal and other requirements to which the organisation subscribes, and information about elements and criteria related to RTS that the organisation identifies as those, which it can control, and those, which it can influence.
ISO 39001:2012 was designed for public and private organisations which interact with the road traffic system and is expected to be particularly relevant to organisations that possess a large numbers of vehicles. These include freight and passenger companies as well as those with large fleets of private vehicles such as those used by engineers, sales people or supermarket delivery drivers. It will also be of interest to organisations that manage road networks.
Global research has shown that death and serious injury can be considerably reduced by adopting a holistic safe system approach to RTS. This involves a clear focus on RTS results and evidence-based actions supported by the right levels of organisation management.
The incidence of road accidents cannot be reduced by the actions of Governments alone. Organisations of all types and sizes, as well as individual road users, have a role to play. It is in this regard that the United Nations has been making considerable effort to save lives on the roads, by spearheading its “Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020 resolution.” Launched in over 100 countries on 11 May 2011, the resolution has a clear goal in sight, which is to prevent five million road deaths by 2020.
Through the development of the ISO 39001 standard, ISO has made a significant contribution to that ambitious UN goal. The standard is expected to have a considerable impact on the future of traffic safety by addressing safety aspects relating to speed, vehicle condition and driver awareness. This will improve traffic safety and aims to overall reduce the number of persons killed or severely injured on the road.
For further information, please contact the GNBS on telephone numbers: 219-0065, 219-0066 or visit the GNBS website: www.gnbsgy.org
