Letter from Charissa He Qing Fang (Ms), Straits Times Forum 9 Feb 08;
WHILE on the bus the other day, I was watching TVMobile when a television commercial came on with teenagers talking about saving the Earth.
I applaud the National Environment Agency (NEA) for taking such an active approach to combating global warming and a host of other environmental problems in one commercial, managing to kill two birds with one stone.
However, a television commercial such as this one is very focused. Perhaps a little too focused? I do not see how adults will be able to relate to those youth. Yes, the target group is obviously youth, and the strategy is plainly to inculcate the values of being eco-friendly while the youth are still young. But maybe targeting the people who are wasting the most would be a more sound approach?
Youth do not have much spending power, limited mostly by their allowances and, for some, a part-time job to supplement that allowance. Although increasingly the young are having more and more influence on the consumer market, the people who are spending real money are the yuppies and PMEBs.
There are many segments of the population which the NEA could target, vehicles are a real menace to the Earth. The people who drive are people in the workforce. Why are the advertisements not targeting them?
It is comforting to see that when the NEA conducted a survey, '95% of respondents recognised that they have a responsibility to care for the environment'.
The message the NEA is sending out is right, but the people who should be receiving it are not getting it.
Perhaps the NEA should adopt a more all-rounded approach to target the segment of the market who cause the most damage to the environment.
Shock and scare tactics seemed to have worked for drink driving and smoking, so why not try it out on anti-environmentalists?
