Image credit: UNICEF Paraguay
Students from the Paraguay Pyahu school in Caaguazú recently attended a workshop supported by the Paraguayan Touring and Automobile Club and UNICEF. They analysed road safety around the school, supported by the SR4S app, and proposed improvements to local authorities to protect children and teenagers on their journey to school. They looked at the existence of traffic signals, pedestrian crossings and the use of safety belts and helmets by motorists and motorcyclists and their impact on road safety.
“The results that most caught our attention when working with adolescents was precisely that they themselves became aware of the offenses committed by drivers. We were evaluating the vehicular flow, calculating that and the students were seeing that 80% of the people who circulated on motorcycles did not use helmets, 70% of the people who circulated in a vehicle did not use seat belts, that there were users of motorcycles that were using the sidewalk,” said Belén Orrego, Head of Corporate Social Responsibility at Touring.
One of the participants in the activity, Aurora Colmán (13), an eighth grade student, commented that she learned about first aid and traffic signs, and asked that the sidewalks, pedestrian crossings, and signs in the area be improved.
This activity is part of the project “Safe and healthy cities for children and adolescents promoting road safety and sustainable mobility”, promoted by UNICEF with the support of the Paraguayan Touring and Automobile Club and jointly with the organization Fortaleser.
Since 2017 UNICEF Paraguay has promoted the rights of children and adolescents to safe and sustainable mobility. To this end, it has been guided by the preventive approach of security systems, the action framework for the Prevention of injuries caused by child traffic, which has the support of UNICEF for Latin America and the Caribbean, and by the Pillars of Action Plan of the Global Framework for Road Safety.
Original article from UNICEF Paraguay here (in Spanish): https://www.unicef.org/paraguay/comunicados-prensa/estudiantes-analizaron-seguridad-vial-en-entorno-escolar
Watch video summary below from UNICEF Paraguay
Read more about our work in Paraguay here:
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