Amman- 25 October 2018

Jordan-Dead Sea, 18 - 19 October 2018

The German Jordanian University (GJU), in collaboration with the Lebanese University of Saint Joseph and with the support of Renault France, organized the first international conference on Road Safety in the Arab Countries: Challenges and Solutions in the Dead Sea region on 18 and 19 October 2018, with the participation of experts and specialists from Jordan, Lebanon and various countries.

The President of GJU Prof. Manar Fayyad said at the opening of the conference that most of the times, road safety issues are it is one of the major problems of international development, stressing on the importance of finding out solutions for these problems requires common strategies and joint action.

Dr. Manar added, " We admit that we do have a real problem and it needs to be addressed as fast as possible, I hope that this conference will be a good chance to coordinate the international efforts to come out with a joint systematic approach to improve the road safety. When looking at the statistics, road safety is as important as food scarcity or the depletion of resources or global warming."

Director of Transport Safety and Environment, from the Transport Ministry in Jordan, Engineer Majdi Barakat, said that the immediate and future effects of accidents on the roads are one of the most important economic and social problems that face modern countries and societies. He explained the humanitarian impact, economic losses, and disasters related to road accidents.

He pointed out that the Ministry is finalizing the launch of a national road safety strategy, based on national efforts from government and private institutions, universities and specialized academics.

The Dean of the School of Engineering at Saint-Joseph University Dr. Fadi Geara said that the aim is to build a traffic awareness culture among the society. He indicated the importance of learning from previous mistakes in addition to successes, hoping to create a better environment with no traffic accidents or road victims for the next generations.

 Mr. Imad Lahoud, the President of the International Automobile Federation at the Middle East, said that the federation established alliances with organizations to obtain grants for the implementation of traffic safety programs.

The conference papers included several subjects such as existing & emerging challenges and issues in road safety matters in Jordan, the Falafel Theory, plan of actions in road safety, the human, social, economic costs of road accidents in the Arab Region, public and private European practices on road safety and road traffic safety: human, vehicles and roads.

In conclusion, the participants recommended the following: firstly, the government should adopt road safety as a national cause. Secondly, adapt road safety as a subject throughout the whole education system (primary and secondary schools, universities). Thirdly: the need for good quality data: a creation of regional/country observatories. Lastly, specific standards for vehicles to guarantee an adequate level of safety.