Situation
Road transport is the dominant mode of transport in Uganda as road transport carries about 95% of the country’s goods traffic and about 99% of passenger traffic. However, the road safety situation in Uganda has deteriorated rapidly over the last years, mainly due to the growing vehicle population and the lack of appropriate road safety interventions from the regulatory authorities.
Additionally, over 90 percent of the vehicles imported in Uganda are second hand and there is no clear mechanism to inspect vehicles on a regular basis. The high number of road accidents in major urban areas is also due to the rapid increase in the use of commercial motorcycles – Boda Bodas. According to the Uganda Police majority of the road accidents in Kampala are due to the use of commercial motorcycles.
(Fortune of Africa 2017)
GRSP activities
Activities
First responder:
GRSP is working with the Ugandan Red Cross to provide first response training elements to augment their existing first aid training that is to be provided to Boda riders through this initiative.
Programmes
Member Initiative
Road user groups
Pedestrians
With more than 270 000 pedestrians killed on roads each year, they account to almost a quarter of all road traffic casualties annually. Certain roads, especially in low and middle income countries, completely fail to separate road users from the rest of the road users, which put them in imminent danger.
Powered 2 & 3 wheelers
Motorcyclists are just 1% of total road traffic, but account for 19% of all road user deaths. This is a clear sign that there is a huge problem and that correct interventions would greatly reduce the road traffic fatalities. GRSP is heavily involved in advocating better helmet wearing legislations and is helping enforcement agencies be more effective with this road use group.
Risk factors
Members Collaboration
IFRC engagement
| Website | Carrying out RS activites | Interested in expanding RS work |
| Uganda Red Cross | Yes | Yes |
National laws
Lead agency: National Road Safety Council
Speed limit law
Motorcycle helmet law
Child restraint law
Drug-driving law
Drink-driving law
Seat-belt law
Mobile phones while driving law
Crash data
Annual road fatalities
10,280
Fatalities per 100K pop. per year
27.4
Population
37,578,876
Estimated GDP loss
not available
Registered vehicles
1,228,425
Income group
Low*
Source: WHO Global Status Report on Road Safety 2015
*World Bank
Uganda news
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