Dubai Municipality has partnered with BPG Bates, the advertising, events & activation and design agency, to create a unique Sandcastle Installation covered in cigarette butts as part of a campaign that seeks to safeguard children from the dangers of cigarettes littering the Emirate’s beaches. The sandcastle has been installed at Al Mamzar Beach Park in Dubai.
Every year, millions of cigarette butts are carelessly discarded on Dubai’s public beaches which can be accidently picked up by young children or eventually make their way to the ocean, where they destroy marine life.
“Together with BPG Bates, Dubai Municipality aims to raise awareness on the ill-effects of cigarettes littering the beaches here. The volunteers working on this installation collected thousands of cigarette butts from beaches and other public spaces. Our goal is to give people food for thought on how pollution of this scale can affect the future of our children, as well as the environment in the UAE,” commented Ismail Al Banna, Director of Corporate Marketing and Relations Department, Dubai Municipality.
Last year, nearly 50,000 butts was picked up in just one hour at a beach in Umm Suqueim with a further 31,000 picked up recently at Al Mamzar demonstrating the scale of the problem.
Entitled ‘Kids Play,’ the activation involves the creation of a 3-metre-high by 3-metre-wide sand castle at Beach 2 in Mamzar Beach Park in Dubai that is covered in used cigarette butts collected from beaches in the park.
The concept was created by BPG Bates Associate Creative Director, Sarah Pollard, and executed by international sandcastle building experts Paul and Remy Hoggard with the help of the ‘’Volunteer in UAE’’ group, and is designed to graphically highlight the problem of smokers littering the beaches.
“BPG Bates is delighted to be partnering with Dubai Municipality to address what is potentially a very serious issue for kids playing on our beaches with a strong creative idea used to address an important social issue across the Emirate,” shared Nick Clements, CEO, BPG Bates.
The ‘Kids Play’ campaign is in line with the Dubai Municipality’s efforts to discourage smoking and the pollution of public spaces in the Emirate, in a bid to achieve Dubai’s vision for sustainability.
