Turning air pollution into an instrument of change for India’s school children
The Campaign: We worked closely with creative agency VML Singapore to launch 'Pollution Capture Pencils' – an innovative solution for healthcare giants Otrivin that turns pollution waste by-products into pencils. The goal was to turn air pollution into an instrument of change for India’s school children, with a pilot project running in three schools in Bengaluru, and the money raised bringing cleaner air through an innovative air filter system to thousands of schoolchildren in Delhi and elsewhere in India.
Watch the film that explains how the Pollution Capture Pencils work, here
We helped drive awareness of poor air quality in schools to make impact with India’s Pollution Pencils PR campaign
The Challenge: We have a strong connection to India and are always keen to work on projects and causes in this part of the world. In this case, to helped highlight the dangerous levels of pollution in classrooms in Bengaluru, where India's asthma levels are extremely high, we collaborated on bringing a global campaign to life to alert people across the world to air pollution, with the goal to create a lasting impact in the region.
The initiative is driven by the fact that 98% of children in India breathe toxic air, according to research by the World Health Organisation (WHO), not only outdoors, but also in their classrooms - where children spend up to 8 hours a day.
Toxic air poses a very serious risk to children’s health and development - this motivated everyone involved.
“Air pollution is not going away in a hurry. Meanwhile, it’s the poorest children who bear the greatest burden. An innovation like Pollution Capture Pencils helps make a change at a time when children need it most… today.”
- Aarti Nichlani, Creative Director
Results
The PR campaign gained 241 million media impressions and has just won a Gold in PR at Asia’s Cannes Lions, the Spikes.
But that’s not why we’re excited. We are excited that this program marks the beginning of a long-term commitment as more air purifiers will be installed in schools across India - which was our ambitious goal with this awareness campaign.
