Blog

London- Taking part in the world-wide celebrations of 2010 as the UN’s International Year of Biodiversity, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, has created a Summer Festival of inspiring, educational events and activities backed by a major online drive to promote the importance of biodiversity to kids and their families.

To capture the imagination of children aged 7 – 10 years old, Kew is working with interactive agency, Pancentric Digital, to produce a series of short film animations.
Designed to inform and inspire, each animated picture will encourage children to delve into the hidden world of plant pollination, fuelling their passion for learning and helping them understand the role they themselves can play in environmental protection.

“This summer with the Butterflies, Bugs & Beasties initiative we’re getting behind the UN’s International Year of Biodiversity and encouraging children to discover how plants get by with a little help from their friends,” says Wendy Shearer, Managing Editor, Digital Media, Kew Gardens. “The challenge is to explain biodiversity in a way that 7 – 10 year old children can relate to and get to grips with. The animations are key to engagement and motivating the discovery of new ideas. Children have fantastic ability to learn and a keenness to explore and the web provides a great platform for this.”

The animations will be syndicated on third party sites including YouTube and social media channels to build awareness of the main themes of the Summer Festival and drive traffic back to www.kew.org where users can find out more about the exciting variety of biodiversity exhibitions and events, plan garden routes via an interactive map or share experiences by uploading pictures of their visit via Flickr.

James Bruce, Creative Director, Pancentric Digital says “Children are curious about new things and tend to be more receptive to things they can visualize. The short animation has educational benefit wrapped-up in a way that is both visually stimulating and with touches of humour that will appeal to parents as well as their kids.”

—ENDS—

For further information please contact Lauren Hopwood on 020 7099 6370 or at lauren@pancentric.com

For more information about the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew contact the Kew press office on 0208 332 5607 or pr@kew.org

Notes to the editors:

• 2010 has been declared the International Year of Biodiversity (IYB) by the United Nations – the year that celebrates the diversity of life on Earth, including every plant, animal and micro-organism. To find out more please visit: www.cbd.int/2010/welcome
• Kew Gardens is part of the world-wide celebrations of 2010 as the International Year of Biodiversity, and is one of over 300 UK organisations, charities and groups supporting this global awareness campaign. For information on events, initiatives and exhibitions across the UK during 2010 visit www.biodiversityislife.net
• Kew is celebrating the International Year of Biodiversity with a series of inspiring garden festivals, events and activities to promote the importance of plant and fungal life to people, animals and the environment. For further information please visit www.kew.org/science-conservation/kew-biodiversity.
• For more information about Kew’s Summer Festival, http://www.kew.org/press/summer2010.html
• More information about The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, is available at www.kew.org/about-kew/index.html