UN Partners with Madison Avenue

We've all heard of Kyoto: the climate change treaty the US famously didn't ratify in 1997. The follow-up to Kyoto will take place in Copenhagen in December 2009, and this time the UN isn't taking any chances. It has enlisted the expertise of the global advertising community to help ensure a successful outcome at the end of next year and Ogilvy's The Greenery is leading the charge.

During AdWeek 2008, coincidentally the week the UN Assembly was in session in New York, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met with representatives from the world’s largest advertising groups: WPP, Publicis, Interpublic, Omnicom, MDC Partners, Euro RSCG, TBWA, UniWorld and Deutsch, to enlist their help. This meeting was the product of an idea conceived by the International Advertising Association to form a committee of the most influential communications leaders to partner with the UN to create a global campaign to help the UN meet its goals.

UN PRESS RELEASE

On behalf of WPP, Ogilvy's The Greenery is helping to drive the initiative with the IAA and the UN to carve out a very specific role for communications in the global effort and to develop a strategy by which to realize its goals.

The challenge is both daunting and exciting. But we are up for this challenge and excited to be part of such an amazing effort of global cooperation.

Today, marks one year to the 2009 Copenhagen meeting next December. The leaders of the G8 are meeting this week in Poland, a precursor to next year's meeting, in an attempt to set targets for global carbon emissions. As noted in the morning's press, some of the world's most renowned green NGOs are making their presence known at this summit in an attempt to apply pressure to the delegates and instil a sense of urgency and responsibility.

It's clear that there is already a lot of passion behind this issue. We are pleased to see such grand efforts by NGO's to help swing the votes and we look forward to joining their efforts to positively affect the climate change discussions.