I’ve travelled to Nairobi on 04SEP08, after 2 days briefing in the WFP Aviation HQ in Rome to continue with a project previously started by TNT CS specialists.

It is ten to seven in the morning and I have 10 customs officers in front of me. And six quarantine officials. And a few other civil and military authorities of the second largest entry point in Nepal, Birgunj.

A few weeks ago I wrote about my stay in Kenya and about the Fleet Safety project TNT is involved in as part of our Knowledge Transfer support to Fleet Forum. The project already started last year and consists of different stages. Objective of this project was to reduce road crashes caused by the humanitarian world and to create a culture of Fleet Safety within the organisations.

After the Management Workshop for World Vision, which was held in the Masai Mara National Reserve.....a very nice place to stay I can tell you....the only traffic jam you will find there is when a hippo and a buffalo want to cross the field at the same time, we continued with the Employee Awareness sessions for World Vision. Usually, the focus with Fleet Safety is only on professional drivers in organizations, but in the Fleet Safety pilot we had targeted all employees.

1.2 million (ONE POINT TWO MILLION!!!) people die each year in a traffic accident. To me that is a shocking number, especially because you don't hear about it so much. And the estimation is that this number goes up if there is no action taken!

13 Dec 2007 "The assignment starts in early January 2008, you will work approx. 10 days in Rome (Italy) and then the rest of the assignment will take place in Nairobi, Kenya. If you agree to these points, then the job is yours...." And the excitement began; when I got the e-mail from Kimmo Laine I couldn't hide my BIG smile and ran to my boss to tell him "I was accepted, I'm leaving to the mission soon".