TEHRAN — Iran’s First Vice-President Es’haq Jahangiri has tasked the transport ministry with formulating a time-bound roadmap to decrease the number of road crashes in the country.

Jahangiri made the remarks over a meeting held with Health Minister Hassan Qazizadeh Hashemi, Transport and Urban Development Minister Abbas Akhoundi, Industry, Mining and Trade Minister Mohammad Shariatmadari, head of Iran's Emergency Medical Services Pir Hossein Kolivand, and traffic police chief Taqi Mehri in attendance.  

Increasing road safety, developing necessary infrastructure, manufacturing safe vehicles, encouraging safe driving behavior, and offering proper relief services are of the strategies which will be adopted in the roadmap to decrease the number of road crashes in the country.

Jahangiri evaluated the road conditions acceptable considering the number of cars and increased number of road trips over the past few years and urged preparation of a national document comprising scientific strategies to reduce the number of fatalities on the roads, the Persian language daily, Iran, wrote. Developing rail transport is certainly effective in diminishing the number of road crashes and it is the administration’s policy to invest in this sector, he noted. 

According to transport minister Abbas Akhoundi, increasing road safety, developing necessary infrastructure, manufacturing safe vehicles, encouraging safe driving behavior, and offering proper relief services are of the strategies which will be adopted in the aforesaid roadmap.

As stated by the traffic police chief, Taqi Mehri, road accidents have claimed 280,000 lives over the past 10 years in the country. The figures and numbers also indicate that some 22,000 people died over the month of Shahrivar.

According to Iran’s forensics organization, some 15,932 individuals were killed during road accidents in the previous Iranian calendar year (March 2016-March 2017). The month of Shahrivar last year alone set the record high with 1,711 deaths. 
 
Although the overall number of deaths has dropped by 3.9 percent year on year, the decrease does not satisfactorily resolve the issue. Road traffic deaths still add up to a significant number.  
  
MQ/MG