According to the UN, road traffic injuries remain a major public health problem and a leading cause of death, injury and disability around the world. Each year, nearly 1.3 million people die and between 20 million and 50 million more are injured as a result of road crashes. More than 90% of these deaths occur in low-income and middle-income countries, which have less than half of the world’s vehicles.
On 11 May 2011, the United Nations launched the Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020. “The Decade of Action for Road Safety can help all countries drive along the path to a more secure future… Today, partners around the world are releasing national or citywide plans for the Decade, hosting policy discussions and enabling people affected by road crashes to share their stories widely. Now we need to move this campaign into high gear and steer our world to safer roads ahead. Together, we can save millions of lives,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said at the time.
One of the five pillars of this plan calls for the building of safer vehicles, with seven recommended activities under this pillar. Among them is the recommendation to implement NCAPs in all world regions, in order to increase the availability of consumer information about the safety performance of motor vehicles.
While stringent crash regulations in Europe and the US have made cars safer in these, and other developed nations, than ever before, the same cannot be said for cars in emerging markets in Asia, Latin America and Africa. According to Global New Car Assessment Programme (Global NCAP – an umbrella organisation which aims to support the development of new consumer crash test programmes in emerging markets), this level of safety in developed nations has largely been achieved through a formula comprising of ‘regulatory push’ and ‘demand pull’.
Global NCAP has said in the past that the combination of national and UN safety standards and consumer information promoted by NCAPs has created a market for safer vehicles. Nevertheless, vehicles in emerging markets are still not regulated for safety on the same lines as developed markets and, as a result, casualty rates are significantly higher.
India
Things came to a head in 2014, when the first ever independent crash tests carried out in India, by Global NCAP, showed that many popular small cars in the country failed these tests, most with a zero-star adult protection rating. This led to an exchange between Andrew Palmer, then Nissan’s Chief Planning Officer and Executive Vice President, and Global NCAP’s Chairman, Max Mosley.
Palmer called Global NCAP’s scoring of the Indian small cars “absurd” and stated that “people who criticise these cars for not meeting US or European crash standards are living in a dream world.”
According to David Ward, Secretary General of Global NCAP, vehicle manufacturers operating in emerging markets such as India, “say their standards are applied in whichever country they are selling the products and unfortunately there are many emerging markets in which this is legal. They are exploiting the lack of a global minimum regulation in the market.”
Latin NCAP
In 2012, Latin NCAP’s crash test results of eight models revealed that safety levels of some cars remained 20 years behind developed nations. Now, Latin NCAP feels that the region is still on the same page, despite the progress that has been made in this area. The reason for this is that when safety requirements were adapted in Latin America, other regions like Europe, the US and Japan kept moving forward with newer regulations and ever more stringent requirements.
“As a NGO [non-governmental organisation] and working in the field of safety, we do recommend to governments certain regulations, and we are following Global NCAP suggestions. But unfortunately we have seen that the influence from the industry side in the Latin American governments is much stronger than the consumers’ influence, or even the WHO data,” Latin NCAP Secretary General, Alejandro Furas told Megatrends.
“We have noticed something that is very clear in our markets. We are paying very high prices for some cars that are locally built, which look exactly the same as the European cars, but they actually have much less equipment. Take for example the Ford Fiesta, the Peugeot 308 or the Renault Clio. In all these cars we have seen that in Latin America we are paying 30-40% more for a car that is completely stripped from safety other than just double airbags in the front and ABS.”
In Europe, frontal crash protection and side crash protection, as well as antilock braking systems (ABS) were the standard required by law as early as 1996. In Latin American markets, side impact protection requirements are not required even now. Furas believes that while vehicle manufacturers may not shoulder the entire onus of vehicle safety, the car industry nevertheless has a huge influence on governments, in order to slow down the advent of new safety equipment in cars.
“In Brazil, from 2014, all new models need to be equipped with double airbags and ABS. That’s a mandatory requirement as of 1 January 2014. Argentina is the same, Uruguay is the same, and Ecuador is the same. But in Colombia and Mexico you can still buy cars with no airbags,” said Furas. “They are still allowed to sell cars with no airbags. The region is fractured into these blocks.”
Information
“We keep buying cars on the market, testing them, and showing consumers. We need to reach those consumers that are planning to buy a car. We’re trying to disseminate as much information as possible. Internet, social media, all this is helping very much. The most powerful tool is to inform consumers,” said Furas.
In emerging markets worldwide people buying their first car, on a limited budget, look essentially for three main criteria: good fuel mileage, good safety and affordable insurance. One such vehicle manufacturer operating in Latin America, Volkswagen, appears to have ticked all three boxes with its Up! model.
According to Latin NCAP, despite the Brazilian-produced Up! sitting in the entry-level price segment, it has secured a five-star Latin NCAP safety rating. This, says the organisation, shows consumers that it is possible to buy an affordable car with a high safety rating. Furthermore, the Up!’s five star safety rating exceeds government requirements, and Furas says he is aware of other manufacturers working to improve their cars in order to match the Up!.
What price safety?
Meanwhile, in India, despite the fact that many vehicle manufacturers have increased safety levels in their cars following the damning Global NCAP crash test results at the start of 2014, cars continued to perform badly in Global NCAP’s crash tests at the end of the year. The two cars that were tested, Maruti Suzuki’s Swift and the Datsun Go, both received zero-star ratings for adult occupant protection.
A key difference between Latin America and India is the cost of a car with reduced safety feature content. In India’s highly cost-sensitive car market, a car stripped of safety features that would otherwise be mandatory in Europe or the US, costs less than the safer version. In Latin America, on the other hand, buyers pay more for the same cars with fewer safety features.
However, the poor performance of cars in the Global NCAP tests in India has resulted in one positives outcome at least: India’s decision to launch a NCAP consumer testing programme.
“We welcome the initiative of the Indian government to launch its own NCAP and recommend that this positive step is combined with the application of the UN regulations for frontal and side impact,” said Global NCAP’s Ward. “Prompt action like this would prevent the introduction of brand new models like the Datsun Go, which has body structure so weak that is pointless to fit an airbag.”
