Sweden – Malaysia International Road Safety Seminar

– To reduce the number of fatalities and wounded we must above all change road users behaviour. This summarises the international road safety seminar with approximately 150 participants held mid November in Kuala Lumpur. The event was also the official launch of Scania's driver competition 2007 in Malaysia and Singapore.

The Embassy of Sweden in Kuala Lumpur and the Road Safety Department in Ministry of Transport, Malaysia, jointly organised the "Sweden – Malaysia International Road Safety Seminar". The event included among others Scania as sponsor and active participant.

Dr. Mattias Sjöberg, responsable for road safety at Scania, stated that only 3 percent of the deaths in traffic in Malaysia are drivers or passengers in heavy trucks and buses. The behaviour of professional drivers is however vital for the safety of other road users. Dr. Sjöberg described present and future safety systems from Scania and Scania's driver training programme. He finally announced the Scania driver competition in Malaysia and Singapore 2007. Both countries participates for the first time in Scania's global competition for drivers of heavy vehicles.

– Above all we have to change the behaviour among road users to reach the goal with the road safety campaign that started in 2006, to half the number of fatalities in traffic by 2010, the Deputy Transport Minister YB Datuk Douglas Unggah Embas declared.

Swedish experts from Swedish Road Administration, Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute and SweRoad participated in the seminar. They shared the Swedish knowledge and experiences on road safety and explained the vision that no one shall be killed or seriously injured as the result of an accident within the road transport system.

Professor Radin Umar Radin Sohadi from University of Putra Malaysia contributed with a Malaysian perspective on the topic.

Prior to the seminar, Malaysia's Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Chan Kong Choy, visited Sweden and Scania in September 2006 to learn more about Sweden's work within road safety.