OurActionStation is a vehicle for the ActionStation community and our collaborators to start, run and win their own campaigns with the support of our technology and team.
Every week a new petition is launched and sometimes with enough strategy, energy, and creativity wrapped around them - they win!
Here is a selection of inspiring campaigns led by our community to nurture and protect the rivers, lakes, forests, oceans and wild places we all love:
A community solution to our plastic problem
For the past two years, the Kiwi Bottle Drive team have been organising thousands of people to creatively and persistently urge the government to set up a bottle deposit system as an essential part of the solution to our plastic problem. Here's how it works:
In 2019, the group had a major victory when Minister for Environment Eugenie Sage allocated $1 million to trial a bottle deposit scheme!
Our community campaign organiser Eliot sat down to chat with Holly Dove from the Kiwi Bottle Drive team to ask how they got this far and for any advice they have for others starting their own campaign to create change for their community. You can read the full interview here.
Volunteer-led victory for Foulden Maar!
Foulden Maar in Otago is home to a 23-million-year-old crater lake with a treasure trove of fossils. In 2019 a mining corporation wanted to mine the maar but were stopped in their tracks by a group of concerned volunteers who formed Save Foulden Maar and started a petition with ActionStation that quickly gained 10,000 signatures.
Feature stories from Newsroom led to increased scrutiny on the mining corporation and the real value of the maar as a unique taonga (treasure) in the world. Geologists at Otago University joined the call for the preservation of the maar, and this combination of attention and energy pressured the council to remove its support and stop this corporate destruction.
Save Foulden Maar's focus is now on bringing the maar into public ownership so it can be protected forever. Keep in touch with the campaign by signing the petition or joining the Facebook page.
A powerful petition for kids to get more time in nature
Celia Hogan from Little Kiwis Nature Play says we are all better people when we spend quality time outdoors and in nature.
“We owe it to our mental health, our physical health and our general well-being to spend time in nature and allow it to heal us.” ―Celia Hogan
Celia is leading the call to allow ‘bush kindys’ for kids to connect with nature and each other. At the moment the law makes it difficult to run programmes where children are learning, playing and exploring outdoors. Over 5,000 of us signed her petition that was delivered at a colourful event at Parliament in 2019.
You can sign the petition to get updates and watch or share the video of Celia talking to Breakfast host Hayley Holt about the power of bush kindys.
Rangatahi (young people) are rising up to stop rising sea levels
Climate breakdown can sound really scary but in truth, by decarbonising our economy, we will create more time for doing the things we love, with the people we love, in the nature we love. It will mean working less and sharing more. Driving less and cycling more. Polluting less and planting more.
A shift away from our consumer culture to re-invigorating community will mean we get to spend more time gardening, cooking, learning, reading, sharing, laughing, dancing, and singing together instead of spending hours on social media, or money on things we don’t need, for connection and validation.
In 2019, young people organised thousands of us to demand climate action. The young leaders of the School Strike 4 Climate movement organised Aotearoa’s biggest march for over a decade. 170,000 New Zealanders joined hundreds of thousands more around the world demanding effective policies and urgent action on climate.
Students from the School Strike 4 Climate movement also used the OurActionStation platform to run local petitions targeting councils to declare climate emergencies.
Wellington Council immediately agreed to declare a climate emergency. These declarations are a way of Councils acknowledging there is urgent work to do to transform our economy to one that puts people and planet first. Nelson City Council went a step further declaring an emergency and allocating $754,500 to climate solutions.
A quick note from our team: Around Aotearoa and the world there is a small but committed group of people who donate to ActionStation every month. They are some of the unseen heroes in these stories who nurture our campaigns from the moment they spark into existence to the moment they win.
If you feel moved after reading about what we achieved together, please consider setting up a regular contribution.