Many are the ways

If all the threatened aspects of the environment were wrapped up together they would make up a ball the size of – that’s right, the earth - because they all link together and are international. Enormous. Overwhelming. Complex. Biodiversity, global warming, rising sea levels, depleted fish stocks, rainforests, food and agriculture; these are not challenges for the weak. One is tremendously grateful therefore not only for those who devote their lives to working out solutions to these challenges, but also to those who communicate these issues to their fellow human beings. Effective communication is so vital that every channel thereof needs to be utilized, not just the written and spoken word, meaningful though the article, the speech, the e-mail newsletter and the professional blog may be. Let’s look at some effective communicators who rely on imaginative solutions to get the message out there.

We’ll start with Greenpeace, which has been very much in the news lately, and whose methods are about as far as one can get from merely talking about the problem. Charged with piracy by Russia for attempting to hang a large banner objecting to drilling for arctic oil on a Gazprom drilling station, 30 activists could receive sentences of 15 years each. Greenpeace emphasizes action, with imagination and in ways that get attention. Peaceful and non-destructive, these actions demand physical and civil courage, as participants chain themselves to fences, rappel down water towers, approach huge ships in tiny rafts and are sometimes arrested, injured or killed.  They are reported in the international news, usually with photographs, and thus attention is called to the environmental problem in question. www.greenpeace.org/international/en/

One of the reasons for the success of the Worldwide Fund for Nature, otherwise known as World Wildlife, is that it appeals to children. Kids all recognize the panda logo and kids in Switzerland can join the Panda Club or the LiLu Panda or Pandaction. There are also camps and special school materials. A few years ago the WWF offered deeds to small plots of rainforest in return for contributions, and I got two for my older grandchildren. My granddaughter wanted to know if she could visit her land and maybe go camping there? Catching the next generation early is the way to go, considering that they will inherit problems grown even more massive with time. http://worldwildlife.org/, http://wwf.panda.org/

The Swiss NGO Biovision has organized an imaginative hands-on exhibit related to food and agriculture and our food-shopping habits. Appropriately named CLEVER, this exhibit features a grocery store through which one pushes one’s cart, selecting food along the way with an eye to 6 criteria (climate, pollution, livelihood, social responsibility, biodiversity, resource consumption). At the “checkout”, one finds out just how well one did in making environmentally sound choices. The CLEVER exhibit is being presented in the Verkehrshaus in Lucerne until Oct. 20. What could be more a part of one’s everyday life than food choices? www.biovision.ch/en/news/events/clever-supermarket/

If you want info that stays with you, both in the computer and in the head, nothing beats an infographic. Plant-the-plate shows you, in only 2 colors and using simple icons, how the American diet could be improved at the level of agriculture. Numbered statistics are there as well, but it is the graphic presentation that one remembers. www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/solutions/expand-healthy-food-access/plant-the-plate.html

Finally there are a couple of somewhat unusual websites that come at environmental concerns from other angles. One, presented by the Climate Reality Project, is called What I Love, and it presents in picture form various aspects that may be what you love about your life. When you choose some of them you find how they are threatened by environmental changes and what you can do about these threats. www.whatilove.org/#!/intro

The simplest way to support the environment is my last suggestion: click every day on http://thehungersite.greatergood.com/clickToGive/ths/home and choose all your favorite causes, of which one is the rainforest. Partners and sponsors will provide funds to fulfill the particular needs of each site, donating a specific amount for each click. Funds generated by clicking on the rainforest site, for instance, are used to purchase and preserve endangered land. You can click once on each site each day.

Happy surfing!