The Ministry of Transport and Public works has disclosed that the country is losing about 3% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on road accidents annually.

The line Minister, Jacob Hara, disclosed this to YFM in an interview.

Hara said the country spends a lot of funds educating people on road accidents, repairing damaged vehicles and treating patients in hospitals as a result of road accidents which if avoided could grow the country’s GDP.

“What happens is that government spends a lot of money educating people and some of them just before they become productive, they die in road accidents and the forex we spend on damaged vehicles as well as hospital bills spent on those injured in road accidents. So, if we didn’t have these road accidents, we could have 3% that automatically grows our GDP,” said Hara.

The Minister further added that this to alcohol and behavior of drivers who are mostly reckless on the road.

He said, “The main causative agent of road accidents is alcohol and the behavior of drivers who make poor judgments on the road and end up having accidents.”