Making a “safe start in a journey of life”

In November, a campaign titled “First car seat – Safe start in a journey of life” was launched in Poland, Hungary, and Ukraine. The campaign was initiated by Raben Group and the Global Road Safety Partnership, and is currently supported by several organizations including the Sesame Workshop, a partner of GRSP. Local divisions of the Global Road Safety Partnership including GRSP Hungary and GRSP Poland, as well as GRSP’s partner in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Road Safety Partnership (URSA), are implementing national campaigns in each country.

The project initially developed as Raben Group – for its 80^th anniversary – expressed interest in working with the Global Road Safety Partnership and its network of non-governmental organizations in selected European countries, in order to deliver an effective and visible initiative to reduce child injury from road crashes.

Target audiences of First car seat campaign include parents, pediatricians, midwives and Red Cross volunteers, with the aim of raising awareness and ultimately reducing road crash injury of children from 0-8 years of age. Currently, statistics demonstrate that approximately 70 per cent of users do not fasten children properly and the need to decrease child injuries from road crashes was therefore recognised as a regional priority.

The project will also include an evaluation on the problem of using child restraints and attempt to understand the existing culture of child-restraint usage through data collection and surveys. A series of short training courses will be held in each country with the targeted groups, offering information on local legislation, instruction on proper usage of child restraints, methods and tools to encourage proper usage, and e-learning materials for professional groups and parents, among others. The campaign also includes an e-learning platform in English, Hungarian, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian, in order to reach a larger audience.

For more information on the campaigns in each country, please contact grsp@ifrc.org