This is an integrated media campaign run in collaboration with the Namaqualand Flower Festival and Kokerboom Nursery. This campaign aims to collect funds for the South African San Council in order to preserve the rich indigenous knowledge on useful plants and herbal remedies found in the Namaqualand region.
The people of Namaqualand have been making use of these plants for decades, even centuries. Namaqualand is the original home of the Nama People, which is the largest ethnic group of the Khoisan tribe and their medical ethnobotany has not been recorded successfully.
Therefore the specific problem that this campaign tries to address is that the Khoisan’s ethnobotany is incompletely recorded simply because most of the stories has been passed on in an oral-traditional system, a large part of this knowledge has already been lost, which means that there is an urgent need to document this knowledge before all of it is lost forever.
The campaign aims to pique interest and revive the practice of medical ethnobotany amongst a contemporary audience. It enlightens the audience of the healing history of several plants found in Namaqualand and make it feel as though these secrets are being told by a Namaqualand local. Ultimately, this campaign encourages people to move away from conventional medicine and make use of what this country offers us like no other place in the world.
This campaign targets a very young, nature-loving community situated in the area that the campaign wants to raise awareness of. The Namaqualand Flower Festival is grounded in adventure, flowers and a love for the outdoors. The festival has planned a Walk with a Bushman where Oom Petrus walks them through the indigenous beauty and medicinal plants used since our ancestors walked these regions. The campaign encourages and promotes this walk and all festival-goers who attends the walk are the people that this campaign will be speaking to specifically.
Upon arrival of the Bushman Walk, each person receives a little pouch with a map of the tour inside.
After soaking up all the indigenous knowledge with Oom Petrus on the walk, each person the receives a gift voucher. This voucher can be used to buy any plant at the Kokerboom Nursery.
After purchasing a plant that holds medicinal value, they will receive a postcard, special to the specific plant they have chosen. The festival-goers can take their plant home with them and make use of it forever along with their postcard that they received.
The front of each postcard consists of a botanical illustration of the plant that they bought plus the plants Nama name, which is the name that the Khoisan tribe has given the plant. Each illustration is also paired with an abstract symbol which represents what sort of illness the plant is used for.
The back of each card is informative. It shows an illustration of which part of the plant should be used, when to use it, how to use it, a short description as well as the scientific name of the plant.
For the concept, 10 plant species that can be found in Namaqualand that carries medicinal values, uses and have been used by the Nama people for years, is identified and illustrated. These illustrations are then used as content to successfully communicate what they are used for and how to make use of them. Typography and patterns is also used to communicate the Nama name of the plant and to bring the “ethnic” part back into the picture. Colour is also added to the illustrations to help with the identification of the plant.
After purchasing a plant, each festival-goer can take their plant home with them and make use of it forever, along with their postcard on how to make use of it. All funds collected from the walk and the nursery will be donated to the San Council as it is the knowledge of the San that is being shared and paid for on the walk, therefore the San community should get something in return.
