Conservation Week ~ filming ‘Meet the Locals’

Ever year the Department of Conservation and the broadcaster TVNZ come together to celebrate and promote conservation in New Zealand. This year the task fell to me to help out writing and presenting the message.

An Auckland TV crew slightly out of their usual environment

With global economics pushing environmental management ever further from the priority list of governments, now more than ever it’s critical that the public be informed of how vital their support of environmental care and investment is. We in the world of conservation also have to make more of an effort to communicate the relevance of the environment to those that live an urban lifestyle and for whom biodiversity and ecosystems are a distant concept at best. So with this in mind I’ve invested my best efforts in helping to craft a programme that will engage those with an interest but also communicates that it’s not our job alone! We conservation biologists and managers can only do the work if the public wants it done.

Anchor Island Kakapo shoot

So the team and I all have our fingers crossed that we’ve crafted a clear and strong message that viewers will understand and be engaged by. It’s a hard balance, especially when broadcasters, thanks to the ratings wars, will always feel obliged to cater for the lowest common denominator, but I’ve faith that the viewing public is usually smarter than they are given credit for.

The TVNZ crew enjoying island life, DOC ranger style

Once finished we’ll link the TVNZ Meet the Locals page to a downloadable version of the programme and I’ll link it to this site.

a presenters eye view

~ by motolorax on August 19, 2010.