A picture is worth a thousand words and therefore visualization has to be a part of awareness raising campaigns. Visual communication is especially key to raising awareness of environmental issues.
Climate change affects thousands of areas, from sea acidification to sudden storms to biodiversity loss. Yet when it comes to climate change, the visual set from which communicators work seems limited: polar bears, falling icebergs, burning forests and the like come to mind. The problem with these is that they are too abstract, far from us, and frightening, so we try to shut them out of our thoughts as soon as possible.
A municipality cannot afford the luxury of the target audience shutting off from the messages it tries to communicate. It is therefore important to translate broad themes such as biodiversity conservation into the local level. A good example is the URBACT Beepathnet – Bee-friendly district project,in which Budapest Hegyvidék Municipality is involved as a project partner. The international project was launched to bring together 6 European cities to raise awareness on the importance of pollinators, especially with regard to what can be done for them in our own gardens and cities.
One element of the campaign is a poster promoting pollinators, which reached all municipality residents in the local newspaper’s two-page annex dedicated to World Bee Day. The poster was preceded by a month-long online and offline communication campaign and a creative competition aimed at kindergartens, ensuring the widest possible reach during the COVID-19 #stayathome period. Also this month, the municipality transformed several abandoned public spots to bee-friendly pastures.
The poster simultaneously draws attention to the dangers faced by pollinators, describes pollinator-friendly plants, pollinating insects in our gardens, and lists the actions an individual can take to save them.
The aim was to reach a wide audience and also to be able to use the poster again in next year’s communication and to make it available for the international partners. Its success was shown by the likes and shares it got on social media plus that stakeholders showed interest in using it in their own communication. (e.g. Budakeszi Wild Sanctuary displaying it next to their own beefriendly pasture)
Viktória Soós was the designer and implementer of the communication campaign that lasted for a month, expertise was provided by dr. Tamás Vásárhelyi, a biologist-researcher, artwork iwas created by Mihály Ferenczi. Hegyvidék Municipality was the customer
The poster is free to use without changes, it can be downloaded > > > in full size from here
