Safe Community Fong-bin

Country: China (Province of Taiwan)
Number of inhabitants: 5,925
Programme started year: July 2002
International Safe Communities Network Membership: Designation year: 2005
Info address on www: No

The programme covers the following safety promotion activities:

For the age group
Children 0-14 years:
In the matter of child safety, the safety program was promoted on both school and home levels. The school level promotion plan established an injury recording mechanism in each school to understand the particular schoolchildren injury statistics of each school. Furthermore, the FCSP also conducted a campus environment safety evaluation and proposed improvement suggestions for the environmental safety of each school. The FCSP also instilled the safety consciousness into the educational activities and programs of each day care center and school. In the home level promotion plan was realized in line with the home safety products promotion efforts of the health department. The program aimed to urge parents to make sure that products used in the home are child safe.

1. Day Care Center Safety Education
In Fong-bin community, there is a very common sight to see the older generation take care of their grandchildren. Consequently, pre-school children seldom receive the right safety common sense education at the home; this makes the day care center the best venue for safety education dissemination. The most common self-inflicted injury among pre-school children in Fong-bin is burns, and worse, it could easily lead to more serious injuries. Hence, we taught burn safety education to all children in every day care center in Fong-bin. Furthermore, we employed animated and lively multimedia teaching aids to help the children understand the dreadful and dangerous nature of fire through drawings. This type of safety education received excellent feedback from the children, and at the same time achieved the best teaching results. At present, the FCSP is in the process of creating the relevant textbooks for the future safety education promotion work to be conducted in day care centers.

2. Promotion of Home Safety Product
The Fong-bin community administration office promoted the use of home safety products in Fong-bin community this year. Together with the local health department, the FCSP promoted the usage of safety products in its numerous activities and campaigns. These home safety products provide some simple material changes to home implements or furniture that often cause injuries among children; thus making the home environment a safe enough environment for children. At the same time, FCSP also gives out complimentary safety products to Fong-bin residents during these promotional campaigns, thus giving the community residents a chance to try their hand at the do-it-yourself home improvement products. This program won excellent public response.

3. School Campus Safety Evaluation
Children from ages 7 to 14 years spend a good part of their time at school. In order to upgrade the safety of schoolchildren in the school campus, the FCSP inspected the environmental conditions of the five schools in Fong-bin using the criteria of the Jing Chuan Child Safety Foundation school environment safety checklist. The FCSP also proposed some environment safety improvement suggestions to these schools.

4. Infant and Pre-school Children Safety Promotion and Education
Infants and pre-school children do not have behavioral or determination capacity, hence a slight oversight of the parents could easily end up in incidents and injuries. In order to provide parents with a better understanding of the safety needs of their infants and pre-school children, parents who brought their children to the Health Office for their immunity vaccines also receive some health education reminders and a home safety checklist from the public health nurse. The campaign brought down the infant and pre-school injury statistics of Fong-bin.

Youth 15-24 years:
Since Fong-bin community does not have a senior high school or university, young people
between the ages of 15 to 24 continue their education either in Hualien City or in the western
part of China (Province of Taiwan). This is also the main reason behind the smaller youth population ratio
currently residing in Fong-bin. However, these young people do return home during the school
summer and winter breaks, thus it is also imperative that the FCSP attend to youth safety
matters.

1. Holiday Road Safety Project
Young people usually return to Fong-bin community during the annual summer and winter breaks; consequently, traffic violations from juvenile motorcycle riders are more serious during these periods. Hence, the Fong-bin Police department would strengthen road safety promotion work and traffic violation crackdown efforts during these break periods. Moreover, the FCSP hopes to improve the safety conditions of the accident prone road sections in Fong-bin, as pointed out by the Road Safety Committee; at present, road signs have been installed to improve the safety of these road conditions.

Adults 25-64 years:
The worker population comprises a good size of the Fong-bin adult population; hence injuries in this age group are mostly road and occupational accident related injuries. Since the adults also attend to most of the work in the community, the enhancement of their safety awareness level has also become a very important task.

1. Farm Safety
Farming is the main source of livelihood in Fong-bin, and a huge slice of the livelihood producers belong to the adult population. In an effort to improve the occupational safety in farms, the FCSP invited the Mennonite Christian Hospital emergency room doctors to teach safe pesticide usage and snakebite first aid measures to local farmers. The promotion program provided many Fong-bin farmers with their first acquaintance with the safety information they found very helpful in their work. Moreover, the FCSP also distributed some snakebite first aid kits to farmers to provide them with a life safeguard when working on the mountain slopes.

Elderly 65+ years:
Population drain has given Fong-bin a very high senior citizen population ratio and, at the
same time, a high ratio of solitary senior citizens requiring care and attention. Hence, the
community needs to work harder in the matter of senior citizen safety. From the high fall
related injury statistics of the Fong-bin senior citizens, senior citizen safety has become the
most pressing and most important task in the Fong-bin safe community program; likewise,
more resources have to be invested in this aspect.

1. Home Visit
Fong-bin community administration office assigns appointed personnel to visit the homes
of solitary senior citizens and senior citizens suffering special conditions. In an effort to
upgrade the safety of senior citizen homes, the FCSP also requested the secretary general to accompany the community administration office representatives during their house calls,
evaluate the safety conditions of the visited home environments, as well as propose
suggestions for improvements. The move was aimed to help mitigate the occurrence of
home injuries. On some occasions, the volunteer workers themselves attend to the
improvement of the more visible danger sports of the homes.

2. Bathroom safety inspection and improvement program
During the evaluation of the injury records, we found out that the most common place of
injury of many senior citizens is the bathroom. Hence, the FCSP conducted a survey on
the bathroom environment of senior citizen homes. The survey found that the bathrooms
in majority of the senior citizen homes do not have slip prevention safeguards, thus the
CSP is currently assisting senior citizens improve their bathroom facilities and
environment. Due to resource limitation, available safety improvements were first
installed into the bathrooms of solitary senior citizens, as they are the common victims of
tripping or fall injuries. The FCSP shall continue to seek budget allocation for the
program and see to the home improvement of senior citizens requiring assistance.

3. Protection Linking Project
The outward drain of the Fong-bin youth population has made it necessary to see to and
help provide for the home safety of senior citizens. The Protection Linking Project of the
Mennonite Social Welfare Foundation Hualien adequately caters to the Fong-bin Community requirements. After initial discussions with the Mennonite Social Welfare Foundation, the FCSP gradually implemented an evaluation survey of the senior citizen residents in Fong-bin. The evaluation helped the FCSP understand the status of solitary senior citizens, senior citizens about to live alone, senior citizens with physical disabilities
or with high risk illness conditions. Having understood their individual inclinations, a report was handed over to the Mennonite Social Welfare Foundation social workers for
further evaluation. Thereafter, free Protection Linking Project systems were installed into the homes of senior citizens eligible under the Mennonite Social Welfare Foundation standards. This benefit became a very welcome assistance to many low-income Fong-bin senior citizens. We believe that the presence of this service system could substantially upgrade the safety and quality of life of Fong-bin senior citizens.

At the following environments:

Traffic:

1. Improvement of the Road Lighting Facilities
Many of the streets or roads in the vast territory of Fong-bin Community are not equipped with streetlights. In the numerous FCSP meetings held, council members presented several proposals for the improvement of the street lighting facilities of certain road sections. After the establishment of a meeting resolution, the Community administration office started to maintain and improve street lighting facilities. In the future, the FCSP shall compare traffic accident related injury statistics to evaluate the requirements of other road sections.

2. Improvement of the Road Signs
A good 40 kilometers of the Provincial Highway #11 passes through the Fong-bin area. Perhaps it is due to the problem that many of the road sections are winding, or that road signs are inadequate and poorly designed that traffic accidents frequently occur in these sections. After the compilation of injury related information, the FCSP had presented a report on this matter at the Road Safety Committee Meeting. Thereafter, immediate responses have been gathered and compiled; road signs have been increased in some road sections.

Sports:

Water Sport Safety (including seacoast and river bank activities)

1. Xiuguluan River Rafting
The safety work involved in the Xiuguluan River rafting activities have shown visible improvement under the efforts of the East Coast National Scenic Area Administration (ECNSAA) and the local business sector. At present, the ECNSAA river rafting safety operations covered the following aspects: water volume surveillance, waterway cleaning, and improvement of risky river segments. The business sector also had the spontaneity of upgrading safety measures, such as the usage of good quality life vests and safety helmets, assisting in the removal of hazardous objects in the waterway, etc. The center planned to ask the business sector assist in logging injury incidents. Moreover, locations and factors frequently causing accidents and injuries are to be improved in the hope of upgrading the safety of river rafting activities.

2. Water sport safety education and swimming training lessons
There are no swimming pools in the Fong-bin area; as a result, Fong-bin schoolchildren have long been deprived of formal swimming lessons and training. Under a joint program with the Jici Beach, the FCSP employed licensed lifeguard swimming instructors to teach elementary schoolchildren with the proper water sport safety concepts and swimming techniques.

3. Water sport safety consciousness promotion
There are numerous water sport activities a person may engage in Fong-bin; such as fishing, bamboo rafting, etc. Hence, the FCSP held a water sport competition in the hope of promoting the right water sport safety concepts through such animated water sport competition. Furthermore, the promotion of these safety concepts also saw to the continuity of the local culture and tradition.

4. Shitiping and Jici beach spots
At present, life saving equipment has been installed in the seaside bathing areas of Shitiping and Jici beach, and regular inspections are conducted to check on equipment status. Moreover, warning signs have been posted on danger zones to warn tourists.

Violence prevention:

Suicide prevention:

Programs aiming at ”High risk-groups”: Yes

Surveillance of injuries: Hualien Hospital in Fong-bin
Numbers per year:
Population base: 5,925
Started year: July 2002

Publications:
Download the application report:
Fongbin Application to Become a Member of the Safe Community Network

Produced information material, pamphlets: Yes

Staff

Number: 2
Professions: part-time or full-time: 2
Permanent:
Temporary: 2
Organization: Mennonite Christian Hospital
Specific intersectoral leadership group: Fong-bin Township Office
General public health/health promotion group:

International commitments:

Study visits: No.

Participation in Safe Community conferences:
1. 12th International Conference on Safe Communities, Hong Kong, March 2003
2. 1st International Conference on Safe School, Czech Republic, May 2004
3. 7th World Conference on Injury Prevention and Safety Promotion, Austria, June 2004

Hosting Safe Community Conferences:
Assisting 3rd Asian Regional Conference on Safe Communities
Hosting ”Travelling Seminars”: No.

For further information contact:
Lien, Ching-Yao (Marklan)
Mennonite Christian Hospital
44 Min-chuan Road
Hualien City 970
China (Province of Taiwan)
Phone: +886 3 824 1532
Fax: +886 3 824 1588
E-mail: cgubear@yahoo.com.tw