The School Meals Programme in Nepal launches Clean, Feed, Read, Learn campaign for better integration of literacy, health and nutrition
Access and equity in education
In early 2015, WFP's Education Unit in Nepal, together with the Ministry of Education, set out with a goal to widely share the exciting shift towards a holistic School Meals Programme (SMP), with a focus on access and equity in education. The team came up with the idea of creating a unique set of visuals for a campaign to highlight the new aspects of the SMP that were added with the assistance of McGovern Dole funding: water, sanitation and hygiene, early grade reading and digital learning in addition to school meals.
The SMP team partnered with a design company in Kathmandu, and gathered insights through focus group discussions with relevant stakeholders to create a visual identity that represents the uplifting nature of the SMP with a catchy tag line: Clean, Feed, Read, Learn, which has a nice ring in Nepali.
Creating a unique visual campaign
“The image and tag line helps to give the programme a distinct identity within WFP Nepal. More importantly, it makes the activities and efforts of the SMP tangible to the public.
We wanted to create awareness among not only donors about the scope of the SMP, that it goes far beyond providing school meals today, but we also wanted to create awareness and discussions around WASH, nutrition and literacy at the school level in a fun and creative way that students and teachers would enjoy”, expresses Mamta Gurung, Head of the Education Support Unit at the CO in Kathmandu.
Communicating the message
The choice of visuals and type of communication materials depends on the audience and the core message. From a development communication perspective, a mascot or a character created to be the lead voice in a campaign requiring the support of communities can be extremely powerful. If well developed, the character has a life of its own, and gains its own support and popularity. At the same time it becomes a natural spokesperson for the programme that created it. It helps articulate its values and vision and to communicate them with a wide audience.
The Nepal SMP visual identity has been successful at doing exactly that; it represents the SMP values and vision widely across a broad range of stakeholders, and is a figure that students and donors alike recognize and appreciate.