On 12-13 April 2016 more than 104 road safety advocates from 81 UNRSC partner agencies convened in New York for a meeting organized by WHO and hosted by UNICEF. Senior officials from WHO and UNICEF opened the meeting, respectively, Dr Etienne Krug and Dr Geeta Rao Gupta. Participants debriefed on the 2nd Global High-Level Conference on Road Safety and follow up activities; identified actions required to meet the road safety-related SDG targets; discussed the upcoming UN General Assembly resolution (A/70/L.44) on "Improving global road safety"; defined current and future activities of the UNRSC project groups; and reviewed UNRSC membership requests.
Keynote speakers included Mr Jean Todt, UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy for Road Safety, and Ms Zoleka Mandela of the Zoleka Mandela Foundation. Their speeches highlighted the global burden of road traffic injury, particularly on children and other vulnerable road users, and emphasized the need for concerted, sustained and urgent action to meet the SDG targets.
Dr Krug introduced a package of priority activities to provide guidance to Members States to meet these targets. The development of the package, which was welcomed by participants, is being led by WHO in collaboration with other experts for finalization in the coming months. Participants also discussed preparations for the Fourth UN Global Road Safety Week to be held in May 2017, determining speed as the theme for the Week.
Partners of the UNRSC's seven project groups convened to define next steps: road safety management, safer roads and infrastructure, safer vehicles, safer road users, post-crash response, monitoring and evaluation and work-related road safety. Finally, partners discussed a number of applicants and welcomed new members into the UNRSC, including two governments, Morocco and Qatar, as well as the NGOs CATARC from China and the Child Injury Prevention Alliance.”