Last Friday, July 16, YOURS – Youth for Road Safety Communications Officer Maolin Macatangay leads the session on Road Safety and Road Traffic Injuries during the Online Asia Pacific Regional Meeting (APRM) under the IFMSA – International Federation of Medical Students Associations. The APRM is part of the annual regional meetings that strengthen the link between the IFMSA students to promote the development of new projects at a regional scale.

IFMSA Regional Meetings
IFMSA holds regional meetings for its members that take place every year and are hosted by at least one National Member Organization (NMO). The IFMSA Regional Meetings are available for the members of the IFMSA. It is announced by the Organizing Committees on the IFMSA Servers and is preceded by a pre-regional meeting.

The 2021 Online Asia Pacific Regional Meeting ran from July 14 to July 21. The theme for this year’s meeting was This Information or Disinformation: Our Fear of the Solution. IFMSA Regional Leader for the Asia Pacific, Matthew Chow, talked about the community within the region that helped bolster efforts of the IFMSA in public health.  

“As youth, we must have the courage to really believe that we can offer perceptive insights into what is happening and initiate these conversations that, at times, maybe hard.” – Matthew Chow 

Road Safety and Road Traffic Injuries Session
During the session on road safety, Ms. Macatangay talked about how road safety is the leading killer of young people worldwide and how young people from low to middle-income countries are often the most affected.

Apart from talking about road safety, the discussion also covered what young people are doing to combat the road safety crisis through the Global Youth Coalition for Road Safety. The discussion covered how the Coalition is supporting young people in efforts to localize road safety efforts in their region.

During the session, it was emphasized that engaging young people are the key to achieve the SDG targets on road safety and for successful meaningful engagement and involvement in local and global public health and development efforts. “Meaningful youth engagement is both the means and the ends for sustained development”. 

Be part of the youth and road safety movement by joining the Coalition! 

JOIN THE COALITION

Last Friday, July 16, the Global Youth Coalition along with UNITE 2030, FIA Foundation, and Restless Development officially launched the Youth Manifesto – a document that presents the main issues and priorities young people face as it relates to the Sustainable Development Goals. 

The Youth Manifesto
The Youth Manifesto is a product of a polling system that was launched last September 2020 during the 75^thUN General Assembly called “nothing for us without us”. The poll asked young people about the biggest challenges they face which were then discussed through the UN75 Dialogue. All these ideas and opinions were gathered in a document that supports the demands of the youth when it comes to the global agenda.

The document emphasizes that young people are often “seen but not heard” stating that this was caused by the lack of meaningful youth engagement on issues that matter, lack of investment, and lack of political will at all levels of decision-making. 

The Manifesto presents the everyday struggles of young people around the world, specifically unemployment, quality education, health and well-being, sustainable cities and communities, climate change, and road safety. To address these issues, through the manifesto, young people are demanding advocacy and collaboration, data and investments, and human-centered and community-based actions

Official launch
The launch featured different youth leaders from around the world to talk more about Manifesto. The Global Youth Coalition was represented by Thiago Gruner from Brazil, Soumita Chakraborty from India, and Simon Patrick Obi from Nigeria.

Soumita talked about the urgency of addressing the climate crisis and talked about how it connected with road safety. “Climate change is not anymore is an event that will take place in the future, it is already here. I would like to highlight that, among others, transportation is one of the major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions hence climate action definitely needs to be planned for in accordance to sustainable mobility and efforts to de-carbonize the transport sector”.

Simon talked about the importance and necessity of involving young people in policymaking and decision-making efforts saying that “we have the solution”, especially when it comes to the leading killer of young people worldwide; road crashes.  

“Just like the way the world rose up to the challenges of COVID, we are also calling the world to rise up to the challenge of road traffic crashes. We’re telling leaders and stakeholders of the world to start engaging young people. Start involving us in policymaking, start reaching out to us and that way, we are able to solve this problem”. – Simon Patrick Obi 

The manifesto was written by youth leaders of the different organizations who worked on the manifesto; Thiago Gruner from the Coalition, Shagun Sharma from Restless Development, Linda Ngozwana from UNITE 2030, and Kristeena Monteith from the Office of the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth. 

ACCESS YOUTH MANIFESTO 

The second week of the #ArtforRoadSafety challenge kicks off today with our artist Sylar Rober Ssempijja from Uganda. Art for Road Safety is the first challenge for safer mobility on the African continent. Held in Egypt, Uganda, and Senegal, the purpose of the challenge is to change behaviors and empower young people to raise awareness on road safety through artistic intervention.

The challenge runs for three weeks that began last Tuesday, July 6 with Ahmed Fathy (Elna2ash) from Egypt and will continue in Uganda for the second week and Senegal for the third. The Art for Road Safety is the first challenge for safer mobility on the African continent. Its goal is to raise awareness on issues around road safety through creative interventions.

The second week focuses on Sylar Rober Ssempijja from Uganda. Robert is a Ugandan dancer, breakdancer, choreographer, and teacher. He uses dance and art to tackle cultural issues.

Through his art, Robert draws attention to the importance of wearing helmets to save the lives of individuals, friends, and family. His message, “Protect your head. Save lives”. 

To participate in this week’s challenge, you will need to reinterpret or reproduce Robert’s Yambala Helmet dance! Be creative and have fun!

Follow these instructions to take part in the challenge; (1) Watch Robert’s #YambalaHelmet dance and download the song by going to bit.ly/yambalahelmet so you can dance to it yourself, (2) Record yourself doing the dance! Be creative and have fun!, (3) Post the video on your social media channels and tag the Coalition, and (4) Use the hashtags #ArtforRoadSafety, #YambalaHelmet, and #YourHelmetYourLife

Each artist for the Art for Road Safety Challenge offers a different message that helps raise awareness on road safety issues identified in their respective countries.

Make sure to follow the Coalition to stay updated on the #ArtforRoadSafety challenge.

WATCH THE CHALLENGE VIDEO HERE 

The ECOSOC High-Level Statement
The statement was created and circulated in accordance with paragraphs 30 and 31 of the ECOSOC Resolution 1996/31 that states that relevant statements related to the work of the council may be submitted by organizations in general consultative status and special consultative status on subjects in which these organizations have special competence.

The statement will be part of the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) which serves as the UN central platform for follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals. The HLPF and the statement will provide full and effective participation of all States Members of the United Nations and States members of specialized agencies.

Last week from 5 to 8 July, FIA – Federation Internationale De L’Automobile launched the 2021 FIA Conference. The conference was held in Monaco and was the first eConference Sport and Mobility event by the organization. During the conference, Member Clubs’ Presidents, senior executives from affiliated organizations, and global leaders and experts reaffirmed the will to increase positive contributions for motorsport and mobility to society. 

Opening session: building back better
The Conference was formally opened by FIA President, Jean Todt. H.S.H Prince Albert II of Monaco was also present during the Conference where he highlighted the event’s role in the future of ensuring sustainable mobility across the globe.

During the Conference, leaders and mobility experts also reflected on the solidarity shown during the COVID-19 crisis and the opportunity it created to increase the positive contributions of the motorsport and mobility sector to the general community.

During his speech, FIA Deputy President for Automobile Mobility and Tourism, Thierry Willemarck, highlighted how sustainable mobility connects with green energy saying “the future of sustainable mobility goes hand-in-hand with the question of clean energy and energy transition.”

Youth and sustainable mobility
Featured during the Conference were different sessions that talked about the motor industry and sustainable transportation. YOURS Head of Communications Manpreet Darroch joined Rafaela Machado from iRAP – International Road Assessment Programme and Ian Jack from the Canadian Automobile Association (CAA) in a session called Towards the Next Decade of Action: Youth Engagement.

During the session, Conference moderator Edie Lush highlighted that young people play a vital role in the future of mobility and that young people have a powerful voice that can be used to advocate for road safety.

This was echoed by Rafaela Machado saying, “We need to let youth know the power that they have and what they can do about road safety.” She talked about how iRAP’s Star Rating for Schools Methodology is one of the tools that can empower young people to take action in their communities and their regions.  

Manpreet Darroch talked about how young people are taking the lead when it comes to road safety and sustainable mobility efforts. “A lot of young people are now stepping up, knowing that their peers are getting killed on the world’s roads. Youth are powerful activists; they are not just the victims”.  

Ian talked about how CAA is engaging young people through education programs that help raise road safety awareness and also help involve youth in their projects and activities.

The #PurposeDriven movement launched by FIA will continue to mobilize the general public and its partners to address the United Nation’s call for action to achieve the goals and targets in the decade of action.

MORE ABOUT FIA CONFERENCE 2021