Why a U.K. grocery ad is too political for TV
A commercial for British grocery chain Iceland about the environmental harm of palm oil was effectively banned from running on TV for being too political.
The powerful animated ad, narrated by actress Emma Thompson, tells the story of a young orangutan showing up in a little girl’s bedroom because humans have destroyed its home in the rainforest to harvest palm oil.
The short film had originally been produced for the environmentalist group Greenpeace before Iceland arranged to adapt the film as its own ad for the busy Christmas season.
In April, Iceland committed to becoming the first grocery retailer in the U.K. to eliminate palm oil from all of its private label products before the end of the year. (Earlier in the year, Iceland pledged to eliminate all plastic packaging from its own products.)
Palm oil is a staple ingredient in as much as half of all grocery products worldwide, and the growing demand for it is having a devastating effect on the world’s rainforests and the orangutans that live within.
READ: Greenpeace says brands refusing to reveal palm oil sources
It’s estimated that the orangutan population in Borneo has been reduced by half in less than 20 years, leaving only 70,000 alive today and putting the animal on the endangered species list. Concerns about the harmful effects of rising demand for palm oil around the world led to the 2004 formation of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). Dozens of Canadian companies have signed on to be a part of the RSPO including Loblaw and Sobeys.
Technically the ad wasn’t banned, but prevented from going to air by Clearcast, which checks ads against the UK Code of Broadcast Advertising.
Clearcast rejected the ad because of the association with Greenpeace, which is considered a political body. Managing director Chris Mundy explained the decision in a LinkedIn post Monday:
“The ad raises an important issue and is not itself political. The political aspect of the ad centres on whether Greenpeace, who made it and have been running it for several months, is a political organization under the terms of the Communication Act. If so they can't by law advertise.”
While Iceland maintains it wanted to run the ad on TV, management knew it may not get approval and by getting rejected the ad generated a massive amount of free media.
The ad was posted to YouTube and shared widely on social media including by a number of celebrities with huge followings and an online petition to get Clearcast to reverse its decision quickly received hundreds of thousands of signatures. As of Monday, that ad had been viewed more than 30 million times. However, like most social media fueled stories these days, the Clearcast decision generated some over-the-top reaction:
“Some of the abuse that we have received has been genuinely shocking, although I understand that this is an important and emotive subject,” Mundy tweeted .