On Saturday 28 November 2009, one of the year's busiest shopping days, just as you are starting to stock up for the Festive Season, Buy Nothing Day is asking people to stop shopping - for a whole day!

Why? Well it's a chance to step off the treadmill and really think about what we are consuming and the environmental consequences. How many things do you buy without really thinking about whether you need them? We live in a throwaway society where we buy convenience things and then discard them without a thought, items such as plastic bottles, cardboard coffee cups and food packaging to name a few. At the supermarket for every £70 you spend on shopping £10 goes towards packaging. Think about it, we're buying rubbish! Supermarkets are organised landfill, they are the worst offenders offloading tonnes of pointless packaging onto the consumer who is then trusted to recycle it.

To support Buy Nothing Day and the cause that it promotes, a zombie hoard will descend onto the main concourse of Meadowhall Shopping Centre at 1pm, theatrically demonstrating how consumer culture is leading us to shop ourselves into oblivion. The “Consumer Virus Outbreak” is intended as a light hearted way of showing of how mindless mass consumption without consideration of the repercussions will lead us into thoughtlessly marching towards an environmental catastrophe that could engulf civilisation.

All are welcome in the zombie hoard : bring friends, costumes, signs and fake blood aplenty!!!

Buy Nothing Day highlights the environmental effects of consumption. Over the Festive Season we'll throw away over 125,000 tonnes of plastic packaging, 6 million Christmas trees and 83 square km of wrapping paper. The effect of mass consumption on society are self evident when you consider that around 10 million tonnes of packaging waste are produced in the UK each year, which is not only unsustainable but also completely unnecessary. The UK and other wealthy industrialised nations make up just 20 percent of the world's population but we consume 80 percent of the world's natural resources and create 83 percent of the world's waste.

Buy Nothing Day is not anti-Christmas or consumerist, however, this an opportunity to challenge consumption. There's nothing wrong with shopping or having nice things, but we need understand the impact we are having on the environment and accept social responsibility towards the developing world.

Of course if you want to shop then think of shopping responsibly, buy more organic food and fair-trade products - get beyond the supermarket and shop for locally produced products from local suppliers, who, unlike the supermarket are in favour of reducing packaging and unnecessary waste.

Although environmental concerns are the most pressing issue associated with overconsumption, there are numerous societal effects that are less well known. Issues as diverse as obesity, household debt problems and reliance upon international trade with oppressive regimes can all be linked to the cycle of consumption. Without reassessing our relationship to the products that are demanded by our society, many of these difficulties will never be addressed.

It is common for people to ask “What can I do? I am only one person!” however, the movies have taught us that it only takes one zombie for an outbreak to occur. Our message is viral, spreading from person to person, so each individual who reassesses their consumption as a result of this action will continue to spread the message.

On Buy Nothing Day people in and around the UK will make a pact with themselves to take a break from shopping as a personal experiment or public statement and the best thing is - IT'S FREE!!!