More municipalities banning meat, air travel ads in bus shelters

A growing number of municipalities are banning advertisements for meat, air travel, and dairy on their own bus shelters and billboards due to their impact on the climate. Advertisers are against local bans, advocating for national rules to create more clarity, NOS reports.

Early this month, the Utrecht city council banned meat advertisements after previously banning “fossil advertisements,” which include petrol, cars, and air travel, on the city’s approximately 850 frames in bus shelters and two advertising masts along the highway. “The main reason is that meat production leads to climate change,” PvdD leader Maarten van Heuven, who proposed the ban, told NOS. “Another reason is animal welfare. Because consuming less meat is good for animals.”

The municipality of Bloemendaal announced at the end of October that it would no longer place advertisements for meat, dairy, and products using fossil fuels as an energy source. Municipalities like Amsterdam, Zwolle, Haarlem, and the province of Noord-Holland are also banning these types of ads for climate reasons.

The bans only apply to the municipalities’ privately owned advertising spaces, like bus shelters, advertising masts, and billboards. Butchers and travel agencies, for example, can still advertise their products on their own signs in front of their doors, in their shop windows, or in the newspaper. Most municipalities’ bans only take effect when existing advertising contracts expire.

Jan Willem Bolderdijk, professor of sustainability and marketing at the University of Amsterdam, doesn’t think that the local bans will change locals’ meat consumption or travel behavior, but he considers it a necessary step. “If you don’t ban the advertisements, you maintain the image that this is the norm. That demotivates people to behave differently,” he told NOS.

Local bans on climate-sensitive advertisements mainly have an indirect effect, Bolderdijk said. “It stimulates the social debate. “Last year, Haarlem made world news as the first city with a ban on meat advertisements,” he said. “More and more municipalities are doing this. So indirectly, it makes sense, and as an individual municipality, you can ultimately influence many more people.”

The Association of Advertisers (BVA) would prefer national rules. “It creates ambiguity and confusion for consumers and companies to arrange this at a local level,” director Henriette van Swinderen said. The advertisers would also rather set conditions for advertising themselves. “We are in discussions with the travel and car industry to consider including a warning not to fly too much and to focus on sustainable alternatives instead of maximum consumption.”