Mexico and Uruguay work together for road safety

Road accidents are reduced through the contribution of the Bilateral Cooperation Fund financed between the two countries.

As stated in the report Saving lives by promoting a safe transit systems approach in the Americas, in 2021, road traffic injuries accounted for 12% of estimated deaths worldwide (PAHO, 2024, p.3). In addition, according to the Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety (GANRS), in LAC, these incidents vary depending on the country. For example, “road crashes are the leading cause of death for children aged 5-14 years old in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, and Uruguay, and the second leading cause of death for 5-14 year olds in Colombia” (GANRS, 2024).

In this regard, it is also worth noting that the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the International Transport Forum (OECD and ITF) estimated that “between 2010 and 2018, Mexico, Chile and Uruguay have achieved better road safety results than other countries” (OECD/ITF, 2020). These improvements were possible due to a public effort in the institutional management of road safety, the latter becoming a potential area to exchange knowledge and experiences in the framework of bilateral cooperation.

Indeed, the fifth call of the Uruguay-Mexico Bilateral Cooperation Fund financed the project: Bases for an integrated road safety management, which objective was to improve the institutional capacities of Jalisco and Uruguay to reduce injuries and deaths among the population groups that are most vulnerable to road accidents (migrants and refugees, children and adolescents, the elderly, disabled people, and women).

The Gonzalo Rodríguez Foundation and the National Road Safety Unit (UNASEV by its Spanish acronym) were the Uruguayan institutions that participated in this project, while the Secretary of Transportation of the State of Jalisco represented Mexico in this initiative. Specifically, it was agreed that the Foundation would transfer the government of Jalisco its capacities in safe school environments, and that UNASEV would share its approach to safe mobility for early childhood —in terms of its regulatory framework—, especially those chapters related to mandatory safety measures; the regulation of school transportation; and the control of the use of restraint systems (AUCI, 2022). Mexico, in turn, would transfer its Accident Rate Map, a multisectoral tool for information standardization and validation.

Several activities were carried out in the framework of this initiative, which was launched in September 2022. For example, among the most recent ones, a delegation of Mexican authorities visited Uruguay in August 2024 in order to design a specific standard related to safe circulation in school environments, taking advantage of the Mexican experience and of UNASEV’s development of a pilot program for signaling in schools in four local governments of Uruguay (AUCI, 2024). According to AUCI, this mission included the presentation of the road safety project and its outcomes in Jalisco, the development of technical standards and safe school environments; support for schools; and the presentation of the law that raises road safety to constitutional rank in Mexico.

April 2025

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Source: SEGIB based on Uruguayan Agency for International Cooperation – AUCI (2024), (2022), Global Alliance of NGOs for Road Safety (GANRS, 2024), OECD/ITF (2020) and PAHO (2024, p.3).

Photos: Uruguayan Agency for International Cooperation – AUCI (2024), (2022).