In celebration of World Oceans Day (June 8), Niantic shared the results from the recent Pokémon GO Earth Day event that took place in April in partnership with Mission Blue and Playmob. If you don’t recall, Niantic issued a public call to Pokémon GO communities all around the world, urging players to join local cleanup events, trash collection and conservation efforts.
Last Friday Niantic reached out to members of the press and shared some numbers behind the Earth Day cleanups:
- Over 4,200 players participated in 68 cleanup in 19 countries
- Over 6.5 tons of garbage has been collected in aggregate
In the light of these results, John Hanke published a blog post on Niantic’s official blog, sharing the vision and passion behind these efforts. A special attention was given to waterway garbage, plastic in particular, and NGOs around the world worked together to clear rivers, canals, oceans and other water travel routes
A number of organisations was featured in the blog post:
- A Californian NGO called Heirs to Our Oceans (H2OO) is a rising group of a young leaders who care deeply about the ocean. H2OO organised four cleanup sites (three in California, one in Koror, Palau).
- Plastic Ocean Project organised nine cleanup events across the USA, including plastic and waste collection, brand audits and more
- Umisakura organised a large scale cleanup in Enoshima, Kanagawa, Japan, rallying around 300 participants. The participants included academics and researches, environmental experts, fishermen, the locals and Pokemon GO players
The story concludes with the following statement:
We celebrate World Oceans Day to not only show our admiration for our players and the larger community, but also to encourage the continued efforts to reduce plastic creation, consumption, and ultimately waste.
You can participate and share your local efforts by tagging Niantic’s social channels and using the #GamesDoingGood hashtag.