Climate Change Message in a Bottle Project Update, 22nd November 2021
Climate Change Message in a Bottle has been to COP26! We are delighted to share with you the success of our events over the last two weeks.
Climate Change Message in a Bottle is an educational arts project which aims to bring the voices of young islanders closer to COP26. The Climate Change Message in a Bottle film, produced by UistFilm at Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre on the Isle of North Uist, was officially released on Wednesday 3rd November, and shows messages from young islanders across Scotland and the world to COP26. The online interactive map of messages, kindly produced and hosted by Island Innovation, has also been launched, and can be found here. The project is supported and funded by the Scottish Government.
Our first COP26 side-event was at COY16, the UN Conference of Youth, on Friday 29th October. At this event, Bethany Walsh and Dr Francesco Sindico screened the film trailer, spoke about the content of the children’s messages, and heard responses from young delegates around the world including young climate leaders from Small Island States such as Malta, Mauritius, and the Maldives. Attendees of this event were asked to respond to the young islanders’ messages to COP26 using this form – all those who have viewed the film are invited to do so. These responses will be taken back to schools after COP26. Below is a graph which details the most common themes in the island schoolchildren’s messages.
In total, the project has received 366 messages from young islanders to COP26! These messages have been varied and place-related, but the popular themes of renewable energy, sea level rise, fossil fuels and plastic pollution highlight common experiences shared across islands.
Our second COP26 side-event was an online webinar hosted by Island Innovation. During this 1.5 hour event, Bethany Walsh, project manager for Climate Change Message in a Bottle, introduced the film. Andy Mackinnon, filmmaker at UistFilm, also talked about the story behind the film. Andy himself found a message in a bottle on North Uist, which had been placed in the ice flow in Baffin Bay, Greenland, by a man who wrote of climate change and its effects on their traditional hunting practices. This online event was attended by many of our participating island schools, and following a screening of the film in full, schools posed questions to environmental and island experts, Dr Francesco Sindico, Carbon Neutral Islands Lead at the Scottish Government, and James Ellsmoor, CEO of Island Innovation. Next, attendees were shown a message from Caleb Maehanua Pollard, president of Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change, and their music video ‘The Islands are Calling’. Finally, members of the public were invited to ask questions about the project.
The event was a great success and had around 100 attendees on the Zoom webinar. It was also livestreamed on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube. At the time of writing, the YouTube video of the livestream had 385 views, Facebook had 292 views, and Twitter had 584. You can find the YouTube live stream here. The film itself has been viewed over 400 times on Vimeo.
Our final COP26 event was in-person at The Landing Hub on Monday 8th November. We were delighted to have MSP for Na H-Eileanan Iar, Alasdair Allan, and Minister for Children and Young People, Clare Haughey, speak in response to the children’s messages at this event. Film footage of their responses has been taken and will be shown to schools after COP26. There are also six panels up as part of the Climate Walk at The Landing Hub, which showcase the project and some of the young islanders’ messages. The film will be screened several more times between other events at The Landing Hub this week, and also at Glasgow Science Centre in the Science Show Theatre.
Despite our best efforts, we were unfortunately not able to put the sculpture up at The Landing Hub. It was driven down from North Uist, but after several hours of gluing together we made the decision to abandon the attempt as we did not believe it would hold for a significant amount of time, especially with the wind forecast which led to the Landing Hub site being closed down for that weekend (6th-8th). Having said that, we have many pictures of the bottle sculpture which was made from bottles collected on the beaches of Scottish islands by participating schoolchildren (see below).
Pictured (left to right): MSP Clare Haughey, MSP Alasdair Allan, project manager Bethany Walsh, and Andy Mackinnon, artistic director at UistFIlm and Taigh Chearsabhagh, at The Landing Hub.
Pictured: Bethany Walsh, project manager, beside the Climate Change Message in a Bottle panels at The Landing Hub.
Pictured: Susannah Bolton, Island Champion for Uist, at Taigh Chearsabhagh with the bottle sculpture, which stood at 3m in height and was made of flotsam plastic bottles collected by participating schoolchildren.
Overall, the film has elicited extremely positive responses, and it has been very rewarding to share it with the public. We would especially like to thank UistFilm, Taigh Chearsabhagh Museum & Arts Centre, Island Innovation, The Landing Hub, Glasgow Science Centre, Youth Scotland, Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change, and Scottish Islands Federation for their help and support of the project. A massive thank you also goes to the Island Champions, Ambassadors and teachers who have been delivering the project workshops and filming on their own islands. Without them, this project would not have been possible!
Moving forward, we will be returning to schools after COP26 to show participating schoolchildren how their messages were received, and what happened at COP26. It is hoped that this can lead them to consider what they would like their island futures to look like and how they can make this happen.