Conservation groups in developed countries have embarked on an initiative aimed at improving how biodiversity issues are communicated to the wider public in both developed and developing countries.

The initiative is aimed both at making it easier for people to grasp what are often complex issues in conservation, but at the same time helping them to understand that an improvement in the rate of loss of species depends to a large extent on ordinary people adopting a more biodiversity-friendly lifestyle.

A consultation is underway, coordinated by Joy Hyvarinen of the UK Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and Will Rogowski of the UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre in Cambridge, UK.

Assuring Biodiversity: a brand-building approach, was commissioned for the initiative and published in May 2004. The author Tim Kitchin of the marketing and public relations consultancy Glasshouse Partnership, argues that “existing efforts to conserve biodiversity are hampered by a fragmented and confused communication”. He says that conservation groups need to treat biodiversity as a ‘brand’ and that “if biodiversity was better understood, it would be better protected”.

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