The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the UK’s FIA Foundation for the Automobile and Society have partnered to promote activities to improve road safety in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The two organisations will promote research and undertake programmes and projects aimed at reducing the auto accidents-related deaths and serious injuries in the 26 borrowing member countries.

As part of the deal, the IDB will provide $50,000 to the FIA towards developing LANCAP (Latin American New Car Assessment Programme), a protocol to evaluate the safety performance of the most popular car models.

Preventive measures are needed to be taken between 2015 and 2030, otherwise road accidents will become the leading cause of lost healthy years among children 5 to 14 years, said IDB.

According to the World Health Organization, by 2030 road accidents will become the fourth leading cause of lost healthy life years in developing and emerging countries.