Advertisements in schools
Schools often ask the Waste Management Working Group (HuMuSz) for advice on how they can resist the more and more aggressive invasion of commercial advertisements. As the problem of companies trying to advertise in schools is rather common, and because HuMuSz has been involved since the outset in preparation of the new advertising law , our organization would like to recommend the following:
Companies with solid capital often target their marketing at children: they are the potential consumers of the future. Captivating children through advertisements may have a long lasting impact, for example increasing demand for the companies products and improving their image.
It is impossible to protect children from advertisements outside of schools. Actually there are some advertisements they should not be kept away from, namely the non-profit philanthropic ones.
The non-governmental environmental and consumer protection organizations in Hungary have good reason to stand up for commercial-free schools . The invasion of commercial advertisements
- may conflict with the social moral values teachers communicate to students
- may spoil the effect of environmental education programmes
- may result in competition between firms in schools, for school markets
Most dangerous are indirect advertisements which make the advertising company appear as a generous benefactor, for example distributing their products while making false claims about their benefits to health or the environment. (They refer to milk content in order to popularize sweets; make children collect throw-away Tetra Pak packaging in the guise of an "environmental protection action". )
