Protec Helmets

On Tuesday, I went to the Protec Helmet company store to talk to Lotte Brondum, the regional development director of Asia Injury Prevention, an NGO whose main focus is to promote raise awareness about the social, economic, and human impact of the increasing number of road accidents in developing countries. In Vietnam, their main focus is increasing the number of people who wear helmets in order to decrease the number of fatalities and serious injuries associated with road accidents. They opened their Protec helmet factories in 2002.

Previously, the only actual "protective" helmets were the big full faced ones, which were expensive, hot, and uncomfortable. Protec helmets protect only the most important parts of the head, and at the same time are not too heavy or expensive, and they can adapt to the hot climate. The big full face helmets cost $100, about 9 days of an average Vietnamese person's work, which is only about 2 hours for a foreigner. The Protec helmets are only around 270,000VND (about $13, which is much more affordable for Vietnamese people. Full face helmets usually weight about 1kg, while Protec helmets weigh about 300g. This is important because a big reason why people choose not to wear helmets is because they say it is too heavy and uncomfortable. Protec also has a variety of designs and colors. Since the creation of Protec helmets, the helmet wearing percentage increased from 3%-90%.

The Protec helmets have a dense Styrofoam  lining which is why it is so protective. They also have a sticker on the back that show that it is a standard quality helmet. Every helmet is tested and certified at Protec's laboratory, and they all meet the Vietnamese, European, and Australian standards. The different tests include, crash, puncture, velocity drop, and testing of the chin straps and buckles.

("About Us")

However, many other helmet companies copy the design of the Protec helmet but without the protective lining, so they are not actually safe. They do not test their helmets. This is a problem because these helmets are not protecting people, and yet the police do nothing to enforce the standardization law.

A really great thing about the company is that many of the employees are disabled, and they give them amenities such as food, recreation and training.










("About Us")

Also, they have created helmets for children. This is important because the percentage of children who wear helmets is much lower than the percentage of adults who wear helmets. The parent's excuses consist of the following:

• The helmet is too heavy for the child and will injure the spine  (tests have shown this is untrue, yet in 2007, 68% percent of parents said this was the reason they didn’t make their children wear helmets, and 32% in 2011)
• The skull cant grow
• Parents think they are good drivers and will never have an accident so their children don’t need helmets.
• They think it is a short distance or a small street so nothing bad will happen.
• The helmet is too expensive and they don't want it to get stolen.

Children are the future road users, therefore it is important that they have the knowledge of how to be responsible.

Works Cited

"About Us." Protec. Protec Tropical Helmets, 2011. Web. 20 Dec. 2011.

<http://protec.com.vn/web/?frame=introduction_category&id=3>.
 

Note: The information that I did not get from the website, I got from Lotte Brondum herself.