Green Cross: Is it a drugstore, tree-saving or marijuana?

You can be doing great work, but a poor choice of name can really bring you down.

One of the international NGOs which has probably not received the attention it deserves is Green Cross International – established by Mikhail Gorbachev to create projects and advocate for sustainability issues.

Here’s the organisation’s logo:

But there’s a few other associations with the ‘green cross’ which are a bit different to what Green Cross International stands for…

In Europe a green cross symbol (often in neon) is used to show the location of a pharmacy. There is a strong association with safety issues, and it may also be used in construction sites.

There’s also a Green Cross Academy of Traumatology which has already taken out the www.greencross.org URL – not so good for Green Cross International, which was formed two years earlier than the academy.

Most interestingly, there is an American organisation called The Green Cross which advocates the use of medical marijuana as well as facilitating its delivery.

Definitely outside the realm of Green Cross International’s work.

In a religious context the name is also a bit mixed – a cross being seen widely as a Christian symbol while green is the official Islamic colour!

Green also has other meanings…

If you’ve read our color meanings primer you would know that green has many meanings, including indicating high-tech in Japan, or conversely death in many South American countries.

What’s in a name?

There’s a few lessons to be learned from this:

• If a name doesn’t make what you do obvious, you need to look at what other connotations there are.
• Symbols and names can have many different meanings and you may not want to be associated with all of these.
• When you are an international organisation you have to get an understanding of other cultures to know how they will see you.

Personally I believe it’s something the organisation will need to address before they hit the same level of awareness achieved by organisations like World Vision, Oxfam, Amnesty and MSF. Still, they have some very interesting work including a proposal to make water a universal right under international law, so you should check it out.

Images: Wikipedia and respective organisation websites