At Amata, a quiet revolution is underway—transforming its 20,000‑rai industrial estates and 150‑kilometre road network into a living laboratory for road safety.
The results, while hard‑won, are unmistakable. Over the past four years, accident rates within Amata estates have fallen sharply, from 298 incidents to 173 in 2023. More importantly, fatalities have been reduced significantly—from eight lives lost to just two last year.
said Mr. Aukkares Choochouy, Managing Director of Amata Facility Services (AFS), who oversees the programme.
The genesis of this concerted push can be traced to 2018, but it gained significant momentum in 2020.
Mr. Aukkares points to a top-down commitment from Amata Chairman, Mr. Vikrom Kromadit, who was struck by the human and economic toll of accidents on the estate’s workforce.
"Mr. Vikrom saw that accidents involving young workers, resulting in death or serious injury that prevented them from working, were not just a personal tragedy but a loss of productive labour for the country," Mr. Aukkares explains.
This perspective was bolstered by a TDRI study quantifying the economic loss: a staggering 6 million baht for a severe injury and 10 million baht for a death.
This realisation ignited a comprehensive, multi-pronged Road Safety Project with an annual budget of approximately 20 million baht, spread across six key areas:
1. Engineering and Infrastructure: Amata treats its roads like a living organism, requiring constant care. Annual resurfacing, improved lighting, and repainting of road markings are standard. Critical interventions have included converting dangerous intersections into roundabouts. One-way systems have been implemented in high-traffic zones during shift changes to minimise side-swipe collisions.
2. Traffic Discipline and Enforcement: With 60% of accidents involving motorcycles, behavioural change is paramount. Amata has a dedicated security team and a strong partnership with local police who conduct regular patrols within the estates.
3. The "Safe Driving - 100% Helmet Use at Amata" campaign was launched in 2018 and been continously promoted. The campaign reflects the Group's recognition of the profound impact that road accidents have on the industrial workforce.
"If a rider is wearing a helmet, it can drastically reduce the severity of injury," Mr. Aukkares emphasises. The programme works with the 800+ factories within the estate to promote compliance among their 200,000-strong workforce.
4. Technology and AI: The future of Amata’s safety drive is digital. The estate is already using CCTV cameras to monitor traffic flow and enforce the 60 km/h speed limit. The next frontier involves piloting an Artificial Intelligence system, similar to one deployed in Amata Rayong, to automatically detect riders not wearing helmets.
This real-time data would be instantly relayed to their respective factories for action. "The cooperation from the manufacturers has been very good," says Mr. Aukkares.
5. Education and Community Outreach: Recognising that the estate’s roads are also vital arteries for surrounding communities, Amata has extended its efforts beyond its fences. Educational programmes are conducted in local schools to instil road safety awareness from a young age.
6. The Amata Command Centre: Acting as the nerve centre for this entire operation is the single-purpose Amata Command Centre. This facility is the first point of contact for any emergency, from a factory incident to a road accident, coordinating seamlessly with hospitals, rescue services, and police to control the situation.
A parallel and equally ambitious initiative is unfolding 55 kilometres away at Amata City Rayong, providing a powerful case study in how a unified corporate strategy can be adapted to local conditions.
"The scale is immense, so our approach must be holistic and deeply integrated with our tenants," explains Mr. Aukkares "Our strategy mirrors Chonburi’s in its pillars but is executed with a focus on the specific traffic patterns and risks here."
A Unified Vision for a Safer Thailand
For Amata, satisfaction comes not from charts and graphs, but from the lives preserved.
The goal is to make Amata a model community for road safety, sharing its successful methodologies with other provinces under the guidance of organisations like the Thai Health Promotion Foundation (สสส).
"The philosophy is clear: we are not driven solely by profit," Mr. Aukkares concludes. "We consider all stakeholders—our clients, their employees, and the surrounding communities. The biggest challenge is managing growth, but our commitment is to reduce accidents as much as possible. We don't want to lose anyone, as these people are the main driving force of our country."
As the sun sets over Amata's twin industrial giants, and another shift change brings a fresh surge of traffic, the integrated systems—the roundabouts, the watchful AI cameras, the security patrols—stand as a testament to a simple, powerful belief shared across both locations: that the journey to and from work should never be the most dangerous part of the day.
*******************************************
For more information
Corporate Communication Section, Amata Corporation Public Company Limited
E-mail:
