Turning the lens on food waste

Client: Zero Waste Scotland

"Zero Waste Scotland – Fighting climate change by the Clyde

COP26 – the UN’s Climate Change Conference – brought the world to Glasgow in 2021. Rubbing shoulders with the likes of Boris and Biden, key environmental culprits and champions would come face to face from across the world for a rare meeting of minds.

For Zero Waste Scotland, it was crucial that the number one driver of climate change in Scottish households was on the nation’s plate – fighting food waste. With Scottish households throwing away around 600,000 tonnes of food waste every year, Zero Waste Scotland needed to stand out and ensure the issue of food waste was highlighted by powerhouse media and everyday citizens.

The conference provided a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get the message out to Scottish consumers that their food waste was more damaging to the environment than their plastic waste.

Whipping up stunning visuals of food waste in the shape of plastic bottles, created in partnership with world-renowned portrait photographer Rankin, the campaign homed in on the shocking statistics.

Delivered via a photography trail in Glasgow’s city centre, PR activity and social media, the campaign kept the threat of food waste at the forefront of the minds of Scottish consumers in the midst of a global summit.

By the end of COP26, more than 1.3 billion across the world had heard about the damaging impact of food waste, with media outlets from outwith Scotland shouting about the cause, including Sky News, Press Las Vegas, MSN News and News of America.