Actions

* Buy Nothing Day: We joined the international movement of Buy Nothing Day. We surprised the pedestrians at one of the busiest spots in Budapest by setting up a street theatre and distributing pills to heal the consumer hysteria. Our objective was to direct the attention of people towards problems caused by consumer society. * Save the Christmas trees!: We hired some Christmas trees (in pots) from a gardener and distributed them among people on deposit. If the tree was returned after Christmas, we gave back most of the deposit. Through this action we tried to make people realize that it is not necessary to cut down millions of pine trees for a celebration, but there are alternatives - our action was one of those. We gave back most of the returned trees to the gardening and planted the rest. * Composting Christmas trees: Thousands of the trees were thrown away in January. We collected and gave many of them to a gardener for composting. * With a catapult for the environment: We prepared a catapult and threw pieces of throw-away packaging at the building of the Environment Ministry. We were armed to the teeth with waste. We informed representatives of all TV channels that companies with a vested interest in packaging won over the Ministry by the very same way -they rule the legislative and decision making processes by lobbying. (Of course the process started several years ago, the previous governments are also responsible!) * Database: We collected the addresses of wasteyards of Hungary in order to help selective waste collection of local governments and schools. The database is available on the Internet (http://www.humusz.hu „Wasteyards in Hungary"). * Counselling to public: Our office in Gyõr gives professional help in legislation related questions. Information on selective waste collection, environmental education, wastedumps is available at our office in Budapest. * Legislation: HuMuSz takes part in law preparation on a professional level. We reported on the Law on Genetically Modified Organisms, presented a Bill on limitation of advertising in schools. At present we are reporting the Bill on waste management. * Experts' opinions: HuMuSz has published some studies (e.g. "Saving returnable packaging systems" and "Bottling in Hungary - present and future") * Access to tenders and protection of consumers' rights: Our association pays special attention to coordination of the movement's activities relating to ecological consumers' rights. Our activists have commenced proceedings at the Office for Fair Business Competition (Versenyhivatal) on consumers' rights and have won some of them.