Part II
Hungary
Magyar Természetvédõk
Szövetsége National Society of Conservationists
Budapest, 9 January 1996
- Költõ u. 21
- H 1121 Budapest
- Hungary
- Phone: 36 1 175 0684
- Fax: 36 1 175 0684
The person and her function in the NGO
- Mrs. Erszébet Schmuck - President of the National Society
of Conservationists
The NGO itself
The National Society of Conservationists was established in 1989
by 32 local and regional NGOs who wanted to form a national network
of conservationist NGOs. The head office of the Society is in
Budapest and presently there are 76 local and regional NGOs members
under their umbrella. The main reasons for establishment of the
NGO were to improve the information flow between the local and
regional groups and to be able to influence policy making on the
national level.
Structure
The National Society of Conservationists is an umbrella organization
for local and regional nature conservationist NGOs. During the
yearly congress the representatives of the member groups come
together to discuss strategy and statutes and to choose the Board
which is responsible for the daily running of the National Society
of Conservationists. The Society is organized and active on the
community, county and national level.
Objective(s) / Goal(s)
The overall goal of the National Society of Conservationists is
to save biodiversity and to protect nature from a holistic point
of view. The practical goals of the head office in Budapest are
to help the member group's activities with a continuous flow of
information, to run common projects, to influence (national) environmental
policy making and to keep the contacts with the international
NGO community.
Main areas of activity of the National Society of Conservationists
Activities with a high priority are the collection and dissemination
of information and social and political activities, especially
lobbying. The head office deals with the coordination of the member
group's activities. Different member groups of the Society have
their own priorities, but education and training and of course
nature protection actions are high priority activities.
Resources
- Human
- At the head office there are three full-time and two part-time
employees. There are no volunteers and/or Westerners. Some of
the member groups have Westerners and are working with volunteers,
but every group has its own structure. The total number of members
in the Society is more than 7000.
- Money
- The budget for 1995 for the head office of the National Society
of Conservationists was 10 million HUF (± 90 000 USD). This
money comes from governmental grants, Norwegian, Swiss and Hungarian
authorities all support the Society. For project funding, two
organization in particular, Partnership and Milieukontakt Oost-Europa
grant funds. Membership fees for the member groups makes up a
very small part of the budget, since many only pay a symbolic
fee.
- Expertise
- Spoken languages in the office are Hungarian and English. The
expertise for environmental issues on the organizational and strategical
level are all considered very high. This is because the educational
level of the employees in the head office is very high.
- Access to information
- Good contacts exist with members of Parliament, all Ministries,
the press and universities. When the Society is organizing a congress
these people are invited and usually come.
External Relations and intensity of the contact
The external relations of the National Society of Conservationists
are based on cooperation. Relations with the Ministry of the Environment
are slightly antagonistic, but it depends on the topic how adversarial
relations get. The biggest source of conflict with the Ministry
of the Environment is their slow and bureaucratic behavior. There
isn't any real contact with environmental businesses. Among the
NGOs on national level, cooperation is growing, and developing
very well, but there is competition as well, since sources are
limited and there is a fight for money. In the international NGO
community the Society works together with Friends of the Earth
International as an associated member and with the CEE WEB Working
Group for the Enhancement of Biodiversity.
East-East Cooperation
The National Society of Conservationists cooperates mostly within
Friends of the Earth International (FoEI) and the CEE WEB, but
they also had a common project with the Polish Ecological Club
(PKE). The CEE WEB has existed for two years, while the contacts
with FoEI have existed longer, but it's only since the last year,
that the Society became an associated member of FoEI.
Advantages / Motivation
When there is a mutual problem, as in the case of the biodiversity
topic, NGOs should work together, or at least participate in a
network on the topic. Until recently the voice of the CEE Region
in the world-wide conferences and world problems was very weak
and not unanimous. This should be changed in the future and it
is possible with better communication and cooperation among the
CEE NGOs. Strategically, motivation is possible if an organization
can get more money for cooperating and/or larger projects.
Since the money is received from the West and they like large
and/or cooperative projects better, it's an advantageous for NGOs
to cooperate. A benefit of cooperation is that we can learn from
each other.
Problems / Obstacles
It is not easy to establish East-East cooperation, partly because
of the lack of capacity of CEE NGOs. Lack of infrastructure,
money and time of the activists are big problems. The time factor
may be explained by the preference for national activities, from
the NGOs point of view, there are many national problems that
need to be 'solved' first. Finally the language barrier is
quite a problem, since generally Hungarians don't speak a second
language.
Surplus Value / Results of East-East cooperation
The most important benefit of East-East cooperation is information
flow among the groups, the exchange of information is invaluable,
it allows the NGOs to learn from each other. The advantages of
bilateral cooperation are primarily visible on the local level.
Some member groups of the Society have good connections with
Romanian and Slovakian NGOs on the other side of the border.
In these cases language is not a problem since the common language
is Hungarian. Finally the CEE NGOs would be taken more seriously
and would more gain power if they manage to speak with a collective
voice at world-wide conferences on environmental topics.
Necessary features of a NGO for East-East cooperation
Practical features are a certain level of capacity and enough
money. Then the NGOs in CEE have to recognize our common problems
so that we can contact each other on a topic and develop networks
between each other. Very important is finally the personal contact.
People have to know and to like each other, before they can cooperate
fruitfully.
Possible reasons for others not to start East-East cooperation
There is still a preference for East-West cooperation. It is a
survival question for most of them, since they expect money to
come from the West, they want to cooperate with Western NGOs.
Then the lack of capacity and the fact that most NGOs are working
only with volunteers. Professionals are needed for keeping good
contacts and running big cooperative projects.
Future of East-East cooperative behavior of the NGO
The National Society of Conservationists will continue to cooperate
with the partners they have now. Initiating any more partnership
would be overwhelming, it would be better to intensify the existing
contacts. Eventually the Society will join the European Environmental
Bureau in Brussels together with environmental NGOs of the other
EU associated countries. Furthermore it will not be easy to find
enough funding for East-East cooperation in the future, since
financial support from the West is decreasing and the governments
in CEE don't recognize the importance of East-East cooperation.
That is the main reason why the Greenway network (an environmental
NGO network for CEE) collapsed.
REC and East-East cooperation
The interviewed person did not want to discuss this topic.
REC * PUBLICATIONS * BEYOND BORDERS - SIDE REPORT * HUNGARY
