Steel company supports road safety campaign

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team May 3, 2007

The Make Roads Safe campaign is calling on governments and the United Nations to tackle the unreported growing epidemic of road deaths and injuries in the world today.

Corus is the first steel company to support Make Roads Safe, a global campaign which aims to raise public and political awareness of the huge human and economic consequences of road deaths.

Co-ordinated in the UK by the RAC and FIA Foundations and backed by organisations including RoSPA, the British Red Cross, Pacts, Roadsafe and Transaid, the Make Roads Safe campaign is calling on governments and the United Nations to tackle the unreported growing epidemic of road deaths and injuries in the world today.

Globally road traffic accidents kill 100,000 people every month and in terms of the economic impact, it is estimated that this costs up to US $100 billion across low and middle-income countries and more than US $500 billion globally when including developed countries.

Edmund King, Executive Director, RAC Foundation said: "As part of our drive to raise awareness of the real human and economic cost of this growing issue, it's important to get support from the commercial sector and from companies such as Corus".

King continues: "Corus is a company that combines research and development with steel expertise to offer on-going material innovations that contribute to improved vehicle passenger and pedestrian safety".

Philippe Varin, Chief Executive of Corus added: "We are delighted to offer our support for this worthwhile campaign".

"For Corus, safety is the first priority".

"Make Roads Safe should be applauded for challenging government and industry alike to work towards making roads around the world safer today and anything we can do to highlight this issue to our employees is welcomed".

As part of the campaign, Make Roads Safe has launched a global petition calling on the United Nations to hold urgent ministerial summit on the issue and to support increased funding for traffic injury prevention.