Musician Dougie Poynter tells Lisa Salmon he hopes his books about climate-changing whales and plastic air pollution will make youngsters extra eco-conscious.
For most individuals, being a member of a well-known band can be greater than sufficient to be getting on with. However not Dougie Poynter.
In addition to being the bassist for McFly, the gifted Essex boy can also be a kids’s e-book author and a passionate environmentalist – two strings to his bow that he wove collectively for his final e-book, Plastic Sucks! You Can Make a Distinction, and his latest one, The Whale Watchers, in collaboration with Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC), who will obtain among the e-book’s earnings.
Though he doesn’t have kids himself but, Poynter firmly believes that telling them partaking tales concerning the pure world and the way to assist save it’s a essential manner of serving to to enhance the atmosphere within the long-run.
“I wish to make it much less daunting for youths,” he explains. “I wrote a e-book about plastic air pollution a couple of years in the past and went to varsities and did talks, and I did a faculty go to final week and the distinction this 12 months with the information the youngsters have concerning the atmosphere was wonderful – I felt like I actually wasn’t telling them something new, they usually had nice concepts, and that offers me a variety of religion.
“In 20 years these youngsters are the following leaders of the nation and companies, they usually’ll have that consciousness instinctively. I’ve all the time liked animals and the atmosphere myself, and felt that the youthful era are most essential by way of elevating consciousness, so with the superior Whale and Dolphin Conservation, I took the chance to jot down the e-book.”
The Whale Watchers, which was commissioned by water filtration consultants BRITA (brita.co.uk), tells the story of just a little boy known as Finn, who finds a stranded whale with plastic wrapped spherical its mouth. And in addition to the story, the e-book options easy-to-digest details about whales, and the way they’re really essential to the well being of our local weather.
Poynter explains, for instance, that whale poo is full of vitamins which assist phytoplankton – tiny marine crops – develop. The phytoplankton absorbs carbon dioxide that’s dissolved into the ocean from the air, and releases oxygen, a few of which escapes into the air. Poynter says this course of has, over thousands and thousands of years, supplied as much as half the oxygen we breathe.
And there’s additionally a piece on what youngsters can do to assist the planet, equivalent to lowering their use of single-use plastic, and selecting garments constituted of pure cloth.
“I discover the pure world fascinating – there’s all the time one thing new and sometimes completely loopy and weird to seek out out about it,” says Poynter.
“I’m hoping that youngsters be taught by means of the story, so it has a long-lasting affect, moderately than only a listing of details. If it’s advised in a narrative, then perhaps they’ll digest it a bit extra. I do know that’s how I digest so much on data – if it’s advised in a narrative, I’m extra more likely to hold on to it.”
He admits the story’s primary character, Finn, is “fairly comparable” to himself. “He’s not very optimistic, he’s jaded and cynical – in order that’s me, now and again having these moments of ‘It’ll be OK’. I’m like that.”
The 34-year-old musician/writer/environmentalist says his curiosity in the atmosphere and nature started when he was about three and have become a “large fan” of dinosaurs. “That was the start of me being within the pure world – I assume I grew to become conscious from an early age how fragile life is on this planet.
“Due to the dinosaurs, I’ve all the time identified that nothing is everlasting on this planet and you must maintain it, as a result of if one thing so large that’s been round for thousands and thousands of years can instantly disappear, then certain as hell we will undoubtedly do the identical if we don’t maintain the planet.”
So has this partaking, eco-conscious man all the time needed to make use of his fame for the larger good of the planet? “I wouldn’t name myself well-known or a star, that makes me really feel a bit uncomfortable, “ he admits modestly, “nevertheless it feels good to have the ability to use any energy or assets I’ve for good.”
So does that imply he’ll write extra books?
“I don’t see why not – I don’t have youngsters, so I discover it very simple to seek out the time,” he jokes. “I’m going down rabbit holes of discovering out about issues, and I’ve received a bunch of stuff on my laptop computer that’s by no means been printed, in all probability as a result of there’s no level to it actually. There’s a complete factor on spiders that I’ve written, however no-one’s desirous about spiders!”
He says his McFly bandmates are eco-conscious too, explaining: “They’ve all received kids, they usually’re very acutely aware about their youngsters’ futures. All of us attempt to use little or no plastic if attainable on the highway and on stage, and there’s no single-use plastic at our studio.”
He’s eager to emphasize that everybody could make a distinction and assist enhance the planet, and factors out: “When you drop one thing on the bottom you may suppose it doesn’t matter, however all the things makes its solution to the ocean in some way.
“International warming and plastic air pollution is so overwhelming and you are feeling so insignificant, and now and again I would like a decide me up and reassuring that one particular person could make a distinction – it’s only a very sluggish course of.”
He’s very conscious, in fact, that the parlous state of the atmosphere isn’t simply associated to strange individuals’s behaviour, and massive enterprise has a substantial amount of duty to assist heal the world .
“Business follows what individuals need, and not one of the corporations wish to be the unhealthy man,” he observes. “Increasingly corporations are utilizing paper packaging, and have a look at the plastic straw factor – it was large to eliminate them, and now everybody’s utilizing paper straws and we don’t give it some thought, though it’s ridiculous that the drink’s in a plastic cup. One step at a time!”
He is aware of reversing the harm people have completed to the planet goes to be an extended, sluggish course of, however likes to suppose he’s doing his bit to assist, and provides: “After hanging out with youngsters on the faculty the opposite day, I really feel very hopeful concerning the future.”
The Whale Watchers by Dougie Poynter is printed by Owlet Press, priced £6.99. Obtainable now
