LUCEA, Hanover - The Dolphin Head Trust has completed filming of a documentary - If Only Me Did Know - that it will be using to raise environmental awareness about the Lucea harbour.

Funded by the Environmental Foundation of Jamaica, the 30-minute film which is set in Hanover - the smallest parish in western Jamaica - urges ganja farmers, fishermen, vendors, taxi operators, students and other users of Hanover's capital, Lucea, not to litter the harbour.

"We really wanted to move away from the traditional modes of campaigning because the message just wasn't getting through to our target audience, and the film is just one part of a wider campaign which utilises PowerPoint presentations and mobile display units," said Paula Hurlock, executive director of the Dolphin Head Trust.

According to the film's writer Everald Morgan, director of projects at the Dolphin Head Trust Foundation, one of the challenges in producing the script was employing appropriate social marketing techniques to ensure that the information was presented in a palatable form to the various target groups.

"The challenge was to ensure that the dialogue wasn't too verbose or boring ... so in consultation with (Jamaican actor) Patrick Prendergast we paid special attention to the type of vocabulary and the level of humour, keeping the target audience in mind," he said.

Enter Jamaican actors, Michael Nicholson, Dahlia Harris, Volier Johnson, and two graduates of the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, who, through a dining-table dialogue scenario did their best to bring the script to life.

For Nicholson, who played a fisherman/taxi-driver, the experience was quite an eye-opener.

"There was a lot of information in the script which looked at Lucea's garbage problem as well as the problems caused by the cutting down of trees. The depletion of fish was also an issue that was highlighted, and there were lots of things I didn't know . I didn't know that the garbage problem was that bad or how important is was to save the bush as mulche. our task was to present without being too preachy," Nicholson told the Observer.

Garbage is Lucea's biggest environmental problem, according to Morgan, and a failure to impress the importance of proper garbage disposal on the town would inevitably give way to disastrous consequences.

"If the message does not get through, the consequences are soil erosion, increase of solid waste to the river and harbour, future plans for Lucea will be destroyed as people won't want to invest if the environment is destroyed. Every time rain falls garbage is washed down into the harbour," he said.

If Only Me Kid Know, will be available on DVD in a few weeks and will be played in schools and exposed to other interest groups.

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