On 21 April 2008, NASVA (National organisation for Automotive Safety and Victim's Aid) affiliated to MLIT (Ministry of Land, Transport and Infrastructure) held a Press conference in central Tokyo and reported the results of the car assessment ratings to a selected audience of about 200 media represenatives announcing to include ESC into the Japanese New Car Assessment Program (JNCAP).
NASVA stated the following: “In order to further reduce the amount of traffic accident victims, it is important to spread out active safety technology in addition to passive safety systems. However, as there is currently no method to assess active safety technology, it is very difficult to include active safety into rating systems in the short term.Through the publication of fitment information regarding technologies with a high estimated effect, we intend to raise consumer interest which ultimatively results in higher fitment rates."
Therefore, though ESC will not enter the actual "rating" an "ESC icon", which highlights if the cars rating have ESC optional, standard or not available, has been included. Furthermore, NASVA has presented an availability survey comparing Japanese OEMs with the Foreign OEMs - the difference in ESC
availability is very striking. For instance the number of car models from domestic OEMs with ESC as standard is 28 compared to 156 by foreign OEMs.
Moreover, JNCAP has at the same time included PEB (Predictive Emergency Braking), which is a major breakthrough for Japan. |
