21 July 2026, New York, USA – To contribute to enhance access to and use of knowledge, UNITAR launched the UN Road Safety Lab during the High-Level Meeting (HLM) on Improving Global Road Safety under the theme “Scaling up and accelerating implementation of commitments to halving road traffic deaths and injuries by 2030”.
Held at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, on 20 and 21 July 2026, the HLM brought together Heads of State and Government and high-level representatives to reaffirm their commitment to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals, in particular target 3.6 to halve the number of global deaths and injuries from road traffic crashes by 2030. A Progress Declaration was agreed in advance of the HLM.
In line with UN Member States commitment to scale up and accelerate implementation during the remainder of the Second Decade of Action for Road Safety 2021-2030 and their request to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and good practices, UNITAR launched the UN Road Safety Lab aimed at improving access to and use of road safety knowledge. The launch took place on 20 July 2026 during the Partnership Pledging Conference of the HLM co-hosted by the Governments of France and Jamaica and the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy for Road Safety.
The Lab is a UNITAR contribution to the UN Road Safety Fund (UNRSF) to support road safety globally by enhancing access to knowledge and its application. By using complementary learning approaches, the Lab is a unique gateway to road safety knowledge, creating a pathway from knowledge discovery to knowledge use.
Ms. Michelle Gyles-McDonnough, United Nations Assistant Secretary-General and Executive Director of UNITAR official statement highlighted that
this High-Level Meeting and Partnership Pledging Conference provides a valuable opportunity to mobilize financing, strengthen partnerships, and accelerate implementation of the Global Plan of the Decade of Action for Road Safety. The creation of the UN Road Safety Lab brings together the collective knowledge of UN Road Safety Fund partners, providing structured access to trusted road safety knowledge products and learning resources.
About the UN Road Safety Lab
The UN Road Safety Lab is an online content hub and action-oriented platform available to the public to improve access to and use of road safety knowledge.
The Lab offer knowledge products including reports, manuals, toolkits, case studies, books, technical notes and much more. It informs stakeholders on how to connect with experts on a range of road safety topics and provides countries’ road safety profiles and ongoing projects.
The uniqueness of the Lab lies in its architecture built on two complimentary approaches that facilitate learning by providing a rich content hub and AI-enabled knowledge solutions to support the translation of evidence into practical outputs.
The Lab has a Road Safety Conversational Knowledge Assistant (CKA) to help users navigate and learn from the Lab’s resources through natural conversation. Users can manually browse multiple knowledge products and can also ask questions and receive concise, source-linked responses. The Lab will also feature a more advanced Road Safety AI Agent that will help stakeholders complete specific tasks using the Lab knowledge base.
Explore the UN Road Safety Lab
About UNRSF
The UN Road Safety Fund (UNRSF) – launched in 2018 by the UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy for Road Safety – guides government action towards achieving SDG 3.6: having deaths on the road. https://roadsafetyfund.un.org/
About UNITAR
Established in 1965, the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR) is the dedicated training and capacity development arm of the United Nations. Its mission is to bridge the knowledge and skills gaps through high-quality training, research and innovative learning solutions across peace, diplomacy, sustainable development, and effective governance: unitar.org