Metro Manila (CNN Philippines) — Aiming to strengthen the country’s road safety laws, the Bloomberg Initiative for Global Road Safety invited lawmakers, journalists and other stakeholders to a three-day workshop in Manila beginning today (June 30).
Spearheaded by the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), the workshop is part of an international project by Bloomberg Philanthropies to provide technical support to low and middle-income cities and countries over a five-year period.
Aside from the Philippines, other participant countries include China, India, Thailand and Tanzania. Ten other cities from Ghana, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Colombia, Brazil and Vietnam will also receive city-level support from the foundation.
In a span of three days, experts will assess laws and media coverage on road safety in the country and the implementation of appropriate programs in the national policy.
The World Report on Road Traffic Injury Prevention, jointly issued by WHO and the World Bank, estimates that road traffic crashes kill 1.24 million people each year worldwide and injure 20-50 million more.
In Metro Manila, road accidents kill at least one person every 21 hours, while the number of car accidents have risen by 21 percent from 2013 to 2014. Records from the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority also reports 90,258 cases of road accidents last year in the capital region alone.
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