Plastic Can Be Destructive To Wildlife

In an effort to impress upon South Africans that litter can be destructive to wildlife, The Endangered Wildlife Trust partnered with TBWAHuntLascaris to create a print campaign that is guaranteed to get the attention of all who see it.

The ads showcase graphic images of the insides of albatross chicks, which are filled with garbage that was carelessly deposited in the ocean.  The message is slammed home with copy which states, “If you don’t pick it up they will.”

You may wonder how or why these chicks chose to eat plastic. The cold, hard truth is their mothers soared over the ocean, collecting what she thought was food and then feeding it to her nesting babies. According to PoorPlanet.com, "On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking."

I would love to speak with the Endangered Wildlife Trust to better understand the impact this campaign has had on South Africans. While the images are horrifying, are they sufficiently motivating to change decades long behavioral patterns? One can only hope so.