Road Travel Safety and Tourism Project, an initiative that seeks to rally stakeholders for public education on enhanced road safety, has been launched in Accra.

The project which is the initiative of the Ghana Tourism Authority Ex-staff Association (GHATEX) focuses on using public education and advocacy to reduce road crashes to make the country's tourist sites less risky for patrons.

The project, which was launched yesterday, is a partnership with state institutions, including the National Road Safety Authority (NRSA), the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts and the Ghana Tourism Authority.

To be implemented over the next five years, the initiative thrives on advocacy anchored on multimedia educational content targeting public places, bus terminals, on-buses and social media platforms.

Among the key focus areas of the project are addressing driver behaviour such as drink driving, speeding and other indiscipline acts that result in vehicular crashes; education on responsible behaviours to curb pedestrian knockdowns, and promoting good vehicle maintenance culture.

Overall, the projects main objective is to lay a strong foundation for safe inter-city travel and promote domestic tourism for national development.

Prioritise road safety

The Director-General of the NRSA, Abraham Amaliba, said the initiative aligned with the mandate of the authority to ensure that there was safety on the road.

He stressed that the time had come for more resources to be committed to implementing interventions that would help to deal with the carnage on the road.

Mr Amaliba said as part of the government's reset agenda, there was the need for more attention to be paid to road safety as a national priority.

"Road safety is not for the government alone; it is a shared responsibility, and everyone must get involved," he stressed.

Great initiative

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the GTA, Maame Afua Houadjeto, described the project as a progressive initiative that would contribute to improving the country's road infrastructure and improve the tourism sector.

She said while it was important to promote Ghana to the international community, the efforts would not yield the needed results if the road transport infrastructure was not safe for visitors.

The President of GHATEX, Adeline Boateng, said the project was conceived as part of the association's quest to help address the carnage on the country's roads to boost tourism.

Ms Boateng said when the road infrastructure was safe, it was more likely to translate into increased patronage of tourism facilities.