Safety Champions Honored

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Oct 26, 2016, 06:13 ET

STUTTGART, Germany, October 26, 2016 /PRNewswire/ --

DEKRA Award 2016 for top performance in the service of safety

The three award winners are Truckers Life, Voith and AXA
High-caliber jury honors innovative safety concepts
Award ceremony in Düsseldorf

The 2016 DEKRA Safety Champions have been decided: The Truckers Life Foundation (safety on the road), Voith (safety at work) and AXA (safety at home category) impressed the high-caliber jury with their ideas and their commitment to greater safety. The DEKRA Awards were presented on October 25, 2016 in Düsseldorf.

The global expert organization DEKRA has been hosting the DEKRA Award together with WirtschaftsWoche, Germany's leading business magazine, for many years. Panels of experts assessed the submissions in three categories on the basis of demanding criteria - for example regarding the degree of innovation, efficiency and transferability of the solution presented.

"By presenting the DEKRA Award, we want to honor the companies, and particularly the people behind them, that stand for exemplary ideas and initiatives to promote safety," said Stefan Kölbl, Chairman of the DEKRA e.V. and DEKRA SE management boards, at the awards ceremony that was held at Areal Böhler in Düsseldorf. "The purpose of the DEKRA Award is to promote these brilliant ideas so that they are implemented elsewhere, too. They can also serve as the inspiration for other new approaches. We are already looking forward to the great ideas we will receive next year."

The high-caliber jury identified the following Safety Champions for the 2016 DEKRA Award:

"Safety on the road" category

Truck drivers are the crucial link in the logistics chain, and their fitness is an important factor of road safety. The Truckers Life Foundation is creating a network of outdoor fitness studios at gas stations and rest stops in Europe. They give truck drivers the opportunity to spend their free time outdoors and be active. So far, there are around 60 studios. Most of them are located in Poland, but there are already a few in Germany as well. The aim is to build 1,000 studios all over Europe. The equipment can be used without instructions, but training material and videos are provided along with the fitness equipment.

"Safety at work" category

The documentation of unsafe conditions, unsafe behavior, and near accidents provides important information that helps to improve occupational safety. Voith, a family company, operates globally and has developed its own occupational safety app, eVAP, that is now being used at all of its locations. It allows employees to record and transmit potential hazards via smartphone or tablet directly at their workplace, irrespective of production processes or national borders. The supervisors use this information on potential hazards to improve occupational safety every day.

"Safety at home" category

Experts estimate that over 60 percent of accidents involving children can be prevented. Many accidents happen at home, in particular with small children. The AXA Child Safety Initiative is addressing this topic. With support from experts, it explains risks to parents in depth and passes on practical tips and information. The aim is to make parents more aware, thereby contributing to the children growing up in a safe environment. The measures taken by the AXA Child Safety Initiative range from studies on prevention practices to information campaigns and all the way to child safety training and talks by experts.

The jury includes:

Dr. Annette Niederfranke, Director of the International Labor Organization (ILO) in Berlin.

Dr. Miriam Meckel, chief editor of WirtschaftsWoche.

Hatto Mattes, retired Ministerial Councilor in the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, Head of the Department for Product and Plant Safety, International Technological Harmonization, and the Transport of Hazardous Goods.

Stefan Kölbl, Chairman of the DEKRA e.V. and DEKRA SE management boards.

Dr. Raimund Klinkner, CEO of Bundesvereinigung Logistik (BVL) and Honorary Professor of Production Logistics at the Technical University of Berlin.

About DEKRA

DEKRA has been active in the field of safety for more than 90 years. Founded in 1925 in Berlin as Deutscher Kraftfahrzeug-Überwachungs-Verein e.V., it is today one of the world's leading expert organizations. DEKRA SE is a subsidiary of DEKRA e.V. and manages the Group's operating business. In 2015, DEKRA generated sales totalling approximately 2.7 billion Euros. The company currently employs more than 37,000 people in more than 50 countries on all five continents. With qualified and independent expert services, they work for safety on the road, at work and at home. These services range from vehicle inspection and expert appraisals to claims services, industrial and building inspections, safety consultancy, testing and certification of products and systems, as well as training courses and temporary work. The vision for the company's 100^th birthday in 2025 is that DEKRA will be the global partner for a safe world.