HCM CITY — A road-safety programme called Lifting Safety was launched on Thursday to identify safety risks in the community living near the Cái Mép International Terminal (CMIT) in Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu Province.

The programme includes targeted education and community engagement activities to enhance road safety awareness among students and their parents, as well as truck drivers who use the terminal.

Both national- and provincial-level traffic safety committees have worked closely with the nonprofit Asia Injury Prevention Foundation and Việt Nam-based APM Terminals, a global port operator, to carry out the programme.

Around 1,000 students from Trần Quốc Toản and Tóc Tiên primary schools near the Cái Mép International Terminal are provided free helmets and given road-safety education classes.

A study commissioned by APM Terminals and conducted by AIP Foundation in October 2016 found that even though most students in the region commuted to school by motorcycle, only 35 per cent of students at the Trần Quốc Toản Primary School and 19 per cent of students at Tóc Tiên Primary School wore helmets, despite road dangers such as mixed-vehicle use roads and lack of separate motorcycle lanes.

In 2017, the Lifting Safety programme will provide training on road safety skills to truck drivers; a mass media awareness campaign; and community-based activities in and around the CMIT port.

Every year, more than 19,000 children die due to traffic accidents, accounting for 24-26 per cent of total fatalities, according to Vũ Quí Phi, deputy chief secretariat of the National Traffic Safety Committee.

Education on traffic order and safety contributes to building a “traffic culture” for students, thus helping to reduce the number of traffic accidents, he said. —VNS