News that we’re filing under “Things We Love To See” – Norwegian football club Bodø/Glimt have recently released a football shirt with PUMA which aims to raise awareness of global warming.
The new kit, which is part of their third kit collection, has a design showcasing blue-white diamonds which represent our melting ice caps.
Image source: Bodø/Glimt on Instagram
The Norwegian champions took to Instagram to share news of the kit launch, calling it a “message to the world” about “the melting of glaciers in the Arctic Circle”, with star striker Kasper Høgh modeling the shirt in the icy Northern waters.
We love this for several reasons – firstly that a big football club is using their platform (or shirt) to help raise awareness of climate change, or specifically the melting ice caps.
Secondly, they’ve avoided greenwashing or causewashing by not promoting fossil fuel polluters or gambling firms. The shirt is sponsored by SpareBank1 Nord-Norge, a community bank which reports no exposure to fossil fuel production.
And thirdly, this is an issue which is quite pertinent for supporters of this club – with Norwegians famously having an affinity with the sea due to the geographic makeup, and culture, of their country. Scientists believe that Svartisen, the second largest glacier in Norway, could disappear within the next 30-50 years.
Finally, as this shirt is made from recycled materials, it really is a well-considered and important initiative that they’ve executed to a good standard.
Of course, you could argue that there are still some issues at hand here, for example the environmental cost of producing these kits (even despite them being recycled – which still requires a lot of energy and water), and similarities with the Fast Fashion sector.
This is particularly clear when you take into account that this is their Third Kit. But this of course is an issue which affects all top-tier football clubs, and the way in which several kits get produced every few years before being discarded by fans.
Premier League football club Brentford recently announced that they would be launching sustainably upcycled club shirts – made from previous season’s kit. We think there is plenty of work that football clubs could be doing to match the likes of Brentford’s initiative, and reducing the number (and frequency) of football shirt releases would surely be an important systematic change.
All in all – we take our hats off to Bodø/Glimt for using their shirts to help raise awareness of the impact fossil fuels are having on our natural environment. Here at Fossil Free Football that is what we are also campaigning for – raising awareness of the way fossil fuel interests are spoiling the beautiful game, and working to kick them out of our sport!.
This blog post was written by Fossil Free Football volunteer, Matt Tutt. Click here to join us as a volunteer or support us financially.
