Summary

The reason for the development of the IMPACT project is the need to implement a more holistic approach in solving contemporary social problems, which need to be based on available data and former experience but also need a clear view of potential and a vision for the future. IMPACT aims at exploring the experience in involving youth in road safety promotion and accident prevention, learned through the ACCORD (2011-2780) and LIVES (2012-5523) projects, and implement the acquired knowledge where it has greatest potential for positive impact and is most needed. It will also use the lessons learned in building a network of youth organizations in Europe, active in the field, as well as fostering EU and Chinese youth cooperation by merging the two project consortiums and will further develop experience by involving a Latin-American partner organization.

The WHO 2013 Global Status Report on Road Safety states "Middle income countries, that are motorizing rapidly, are the hardest hit." and "Eighty per cent of road traffic deaths occur in middle-income countries, which account for 72% of the world’s population, but only 52% of the world’s registered vehicles. This indicates that these countries bear a disproportionately high burden of road traffic deaths relative to their level of motorization." This is why IMPACT focuses on such countries in EU, Asia and Latin America to support not only reaching the 2020 EU road safety target of halving the road victims but also the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020. Those are Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Argentina and China. An experienced Austrian research center will add value as a project evaluator.

The IMPACT output will consist of 3 international meetings plus a seminar and a conference, 5 international trainings and 6 successful local road safety campaigns in two editions each, based on cross-fertilized EU, Asian and Latin-American awareness raising campaigns experience, achieved through the use of modern information and communication materials, developed in the framework of the project, and focused on vulnerable road users. The project impact will consist of 1 230 directly involved young people, on top of 112 000 informed people. It will also develop an easily transferable methodology and materials to address the problems of vulnerable road users in different social contexts, including building high-tech capacity in the European partner organizations.