Over 150 restaurants in Nam Dinh province will join in the project, A Matter of Attitude – Reducing Consumption of Wildlife Products in Hanoi, by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Greater Mekong and TRAFFIC.

The WWF’s green restaurant campaign in Hanoi was successfully conducted in two periods: in February and between July and August 2009. The campaign attracted more than 160 restaurants in Hanoi, all committed to not serving wildlife on their menus.

Proving its success, the campaign is now expanding to nearby province Nam Dinh. An organisation called Environmental B&G (Blue&Green), has adopted this campaign in garnering support from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in Nam Dinh.

The WWF will have a supporting role in this campaign, cand will share the experiences from its Hanoi campaign. It’s expected that this campaign will reach over 150 restaurants in Nam Dinh between February and the end of June.

This activity is part of the second phase of the project, a joint effort between WWF Greater Mekong and TRAFFIC, and funded by the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA).

“We want to do this campaign in Nam Dinh, as we see so many restaurants serving endangered wildlife products in the province,” said Pham Dinh Ngoc, leader of Blue&Green.

The campaign will work as an awareness-raising activity for local restaurants and people, on wildlife protection in Nam Dinh. There are around 40 volunteers who will take part to help make the campaign successful.

“These volunteers have come out to say that they want to stop this consumption in their community, and we are more than happy to do all we can to support them in this combined effort to save Vietnam’s natural heritage,” said Julianne Becker, the WWF Vietnam communications manager and project coordinator.

This is a huge step forward in the fight to stop the illegal wildlife trade. This campaign is currently only active in Hanoi and Nam Dinh. The WWF hopes it will spread to many other areas within the country, and even internationally./.