WASHINGTON, DECEMBER 10, 2024 — The World Bank’s Global Road Safety Facility (GRSF) has been awarded a prestigious Prince Michael International Road Safety Award for its outstanding contributions to road safety over the past decade. This honor, bestowed annually by HRH Prince Michael of Kent (UK), recognizes exceptional achievements and innovation in improving global road safety. The win marks GRSF and the World Bank’s seventh Prince Michael Award and follows a landmark triple award win in 2020.
This year, GRSF was recognized for its submission, “A Decade of Saving Lives Through Catalyzing Road Safety Investments,” which highlights its pioneering role in leveraging World Bank financing to deliver critical road safety solutions across low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
From mid-2013 to mid-2023, GRSF catalyzed $3.34 billion in World Bank financing for road safety investments. These investments have benefitted over 65 million people with safer road access between 2018 and 2023 alone, which is roughly equivalent to the population of South Africa or the United Kingdom.
“Road crashes are not only a human tragedy and a major public health issue, but also impose high socioeconomic costs, especially on the poor. Yet meaningful progress on this challenging issue can be made, as the past decade of results from GRSF has shown. The next step is to significantly scale up financing so that more lives can be saved,” said Said Dahdah, GRSF Program Manager at the World Bank.
Congratulating GRSF, HRH Prince Michael of Kent said: “The financial and technical support provided has made a considerable contribution to reducing risk in many developing countries.”
Since its founding in 2006 as a multi-donor trust fund managed by the World Bank, GRSF has been dedicated to reducing road traffic fatalities and serious injuries in LMICs, where the need is greatest. GRSF’s approach combines grant funding, technical assistance, and rigorous research to foster measurable and sustainable improvements in road safety.
In Nepal, for instance, GRSF-funded crash barriers along mountainous roads are projected to save over 3,400 lives over their 20-year life span. In Iraq, a World Bank project supported by GRSF led to an 81% reduction in road fatalities along 225 km of critical transport corridors via improvements to intersections and other road safety enhancements. And in Bangladesh, GRSF catalyzed and informed the $358 million Bangladesh Road Safety Project in 2023, the largest standalone road safety project ever approved by the World Bank.
GRSF’s integration within the World Bank Group, alongside sustained funding from its partners—Bloomberg Philanthropies Initiative for Global Road Safety; TotalEnergies Foundation; and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, acting through the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Department of Health and Social Care—ensures that GRSF will continue to drive meaningful progress in road safety worldwide.
For more information about the Global Road Safety Facility and its transformative impact, please visit www.globalroadsafetyfacility.org.
For more information about the Prince Michael International Road Safety Award, please visit www.roadsafetyawards.com.
