Road safety: new challenges for the future

On Thursday, October 27, 2016, the third global conference on road safety is taking place in Paris. Public-sector stakeholders, businesses, non-profits, research organizations and civil society stakeholders are gathering to address road safety challenges. In November 2015, in Brasilia, several insurers declared their commitment to the promoting the Decade of Action for Road Safety and helping to achieve the road safety targets set out in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.

One year on, AXA is continuing to work to make roads around the world safer, through measures taken in four major areas:

Building partnerships with public authorities

AXA has been a partner of the IFC/World Bank since 2014 and a member of the Global Road Safety Partnership since 2015. These partnerships enable AXA to explore global solutions to reduce the number of road traffic deaths and injuries.

This year, AXA Mexico also teamed up with the non-profit Reacciona por la vida and with the Mexican government to build a stricter legal framework to promote mobility and take concrete action to reinforce road safety. Their campaign aims to make road safety a national priority, in order to halve the number of deaths and injuries from road traffic in Mexico.

Raising awareness through education

AXA Prévention, the AXA France non-profit organization focusing on prevention, is working to improve motorcyclist safety. Motorcycle drivers continue to be an especially vulnerable group: motorcycles account for only 2% of road traffic, but 43% of serious injuries and 22% of deaths from accidents on the road.

Standardizing motorcycle safety gear and introducing an obligation to wear gloves have been core priorities for AXA Prévention since 2004. In 2016, these efforts led to a decision by public policymakers to make wearing regulatory gloves mandatory by law.

In November, AXA Prévention launched a campaign (“Sauve tes doigts”) to raise awareness of the risks of injury for motorcycle drivers and to encourage them to wear appropriate protective clothing. To support this message, 1,000 gloves will be distributed during awareness-raising events.

AXA Prévention also focused on preventing mobile related accidents with a special campaign. In 2016, one in two French uses his smartphone while driving. And texting while driving multiplies accident risks by 23. Click here to learn more.

Embedding road safety in AXA’s products and services

Being a responsible insurer also means incorporating protection and prevention into all of the products and services developed by AXA.

Supporting science and research

A knowledge base on road accidents is essential to developing effective prevention initiatives. This information is constantly evolving, which is why AXA supports research by bringing together a community of experts at the forefront of risk research. In Spain, the Ponle Freno research center focuses on studying the causes and consequences of road accidents and the behaviors of road users.

In Switzerland, AXA works with research centers to gather up-to-date data on road accidents, using dummies in crash tests and simulations.

During this conference, AXA will be participating in the “Insurance and Road Safety” workshop. Proposals developed during the conference will be published in January 2017 in a global report to help better overcome road safety challenges.