Visual Pollution Through Excessive Outdoor Advertisements

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Advertisers, in emerging economies, typically use outdoor advertisements (OA) to reach the public and their eagerness within an unregulated outdoor advertising industry lead to visual pollution. With field observation, photography and Geographic Information Systems (GIS), this research investigates the contribution of the excessive usage of billboards, banners and posters in the urban city of Accra, Ghana. Many unhealthy scenes created by outdoor advertisements were recorded in the city. In June 2020, the frequencies, the spatial distributions and the types of OA were recorded on the Spintex Road of Accra. Archived data were retrieved via the Google Street View map for the period of March 2016. A 22% decrease in the total number of OA on the road was noted between 2016 and 2020. Analyses show that there is a significant difference in the overall OA data between the two data sets. The road was segmented into 100 m sections and the data were merged and mapped to bring out the compounded effect of OA leading to visual pollution. Overall, the mapping of the road shows excessive numbers of OA and the various shifts in the status of the sections from the year 2016 to 2020 are explained by ongoing activities at a particular time. The study illustrates the contribution of OA to visual pollution due to its inadequate regulatory nature and cluttering on urban roads. It also provides a monitoring tool against the proliferation of OA. This research not only raises awareness of the increasingly un-sightly and uncontrolled OAs in the city but also proposes policy recommendation for the economic and environmental management of urban cities. Finally, it appeals to advertisers to engage in environmentally-friendly outdoor advertising.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationPalgrave Studies of Marketing in Emerging Economies
PublisherPalgrave Macmillan
Pages193-228
Number of pages36
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2021

Publication series

NamePalgrave Studies of Marketing in Emerging Economies
VolumePart F3548
ISSN (Print)2730-5554
ISSN (Electronic)2730-5562

Keywords

  • Mapping
  • Outdoor advertisements
  • Urban roads
  • Visual pollution

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