Results Focus at the System Level

The Situation in Brazil

Yet, a positive sign of improving Road Safety results focus is that the target of a 50% decrease in fatalities by 2020, based on the target in the United Nations Global Plan for the Decade of Action for Road Safety⁴², has been identified as the working target by a number of Road Safety staff in municipalities as well as some states (e.g., by the State Committee for the Mobilization of Road Safety in Rio Grande do Sul, by the municipalities of Sao Paulo City, and Canoas in Rio Grande do Sul).

The absence of a comprehensive, complete national crash database, from which results can be monitored, is a profound impediment to setting and monitoring national targets, monitoring progress, effective advocacy, and building political and civil society ownership, conducive to the stronger political decision making required for substantial road safety improvement. Yet, some exceptional federal departments do have results focused management of road trauma for the components of the problem for which they are responsible (for example, Federal Police for federal roads and DNIT for speed management on federal roads).

Below the federal level, there is a broad, but not complete, absence of an evidence-based targeted approach and clear setting of priorities. States vary in results focus but are all hampered by crash data limitations. Small municipal governments demonstrate a clear absence of awareness of Road Safety, and allocate road maintenance and improvement resources on the basis of community expressions of concern rather than any evidence of Road Safety problems. Even when municipalities have access to crash data, there is often no long term management strategy, articulated plan or clear improvement target for Road Safety. This situation occurs, to a significant extent, in the larger municipalities as well. Municipalities are nonetheless critical to the delivery of Road Safety and the achievement of the target of a 50% reduction in fatalities by 2020 set in the Global Plan for the Decade of Action in Road Safety⁴³.

Government agencies vary in the extent of their Road Safety focus. Certain teams within some agencies have a clear Road Safety focus (such as in road departments, Police, DETRAN, and key officers in some states and municipalities). The results focused efforts of the small number of enthusiastic expert staff and managers in roads agencies are limited to specific and narrow areas of delivery, such as treatment of some black spots on State roads only largely through ‘lines and signs’, which are too often misperceived as the key tools of Road Safety engineering. Despite cautiously positive commentaries from many people interviewed, it is apparent that limited legal responsibilities and powers, lack of coordination of emergency responses to serious crashes, lack of real power in Road Safety departments which are significantly marginalized, and lack of significant sustainable funding, have all substantially limited the abilities of these organizations to deliver Road Safety and sustain a results focus in the face of disempowerment.

Crash database issues. Of all the crash data collection and storage systems in Brazil, no one meets the core criteria required of such a system to provide a full and effective data source on crashes to guide and monitor Road Safety performance. The best official national coverage comes from DataSUS while the Federal Highway Police data and state police systems contain superior detail of the crashes partially allowing identification of interventions for federal and state roads. Thus, a full results focus for broad management and monitoring of Road Safety is not possible at the national level. Improving Road Safety by targeting Road Safety interventions accurately and monitoring results, require a sound crash database and ultimately a comprehensive Road Safety observatory.

Collaboration and coordination of agencies with databases to produce the required single combined police based crash database covering the country is needed. There is a varying degree of results focus across the federal governments departments, and the states, though the state agencies focus on state roads only. While this remains of value for the states’ management of engineering and state police enforcement on state roads, this does not create a collaborative focus, or allow a broader picture of the problem for advocacy, coordination or broader education and enforcement purposes at federal or state levels. Attempts to improve coordination of data and other aspects of Road Safety management are occurring at the municipal level through the RS10 project in 5 cities and a pilot project to link the databases in the 26 Capitals, Federal District and 2 Cities, though crosschecking of data from SAMU, Fire Department, Federal Highway Police, State Highway Police and Municipal Guards.