The United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) in collaboration with the Ministry of Transport and Diageo, a global leader in the beverage alcohol industry, have on Friday in Abuja announced the renewal of a three-year partnership agreement.
The collaboration will see a series of major road safety events to reduce traffic death and injuries, and improve road safety globally.
According to the Managing Director of Diageo Guinness Nigeria, Mr. Baker Magunda, “It is an honour to be in Abuja today attending this conference and I am proud of our partnership with UNITAR and the progress we have made and are continuing to make to effectively address the issues of road safety, particularly drinking and driving, in Nigeria and across the globe.
“All road crashes attributable to alcohol are preventable and we are committed to tackling alcohol misuse through a mixture of policies, programmes and partnerships.
“We will continue to support and work with experts to create a positive change by promoting road safety and responsible consumption in Nigeria and all other countries that we do business in.”
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Also, UNITAR and Diageo will look to train law enforcers to deliver random breath testing and provide the equipment required to support the high visibility enforcement, whilst raising public awareness through media engagement.
Speaking at the event, Mr. Alex Mejia, Division Director at UNITAR said: “With the support of Diageo, we have organised four global events and five country events in Africa, Latin America and Asia.
“We are very proud of this partnership, which aims to improve the capacity of public and civil entities involved in road safety across the world, especially in countries with a high incidence of road accidents and injuries.”
According to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2015, the world’s most populous countries account for almost 4.2 billion people and 56% of the world’s road traffic deaths, one of these countries being Nigeria.
Diageo is set to unveil for the first time in Nigeria, the launch of high visibility enforcement training which will take place in Lagos. The training, which has been rolled out globally, has been proven to effectively reduce alcohol-related traffic fatalities including in Mexico, where this intervention resulted in a 40% reduction.
The global alcoholic beverages brand therefore urged participants at the conference to ‘Join the Pact’ – to commit to never drink and drive, contributing to the goal of securing 80 million pledges by 2025 as part of Its global responsible drinking campaign.
The conference contributes to the road safety-related SDG targets and the first initiative under the renewed UNITAR and Diageo partnership. Since partnering, more than 30 countries have participated in workshops for government officials at both national and local levels, awareness-raising roadshows for young people, and high-level conferences on the issue.
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