Consumers in Action: 2025 Highlights To Date
As we pass the halfway mark of 2025, we reflect—and celebrate our achievements so far this year. Across the world, consumers are navigating rising costs of living, the impact of tariffs, and persistent threats to safety, privacy, and sustainability. These global shifts are reshaping how people access essential products and services, and they underscore why our mission matters more than ever.
At Consumers International, we’ve responded to these pressures with determination and partnership. Together with our Members and partners, we’ve powered landmark change, forged new collaborations, and elevated consumer voices on the global stage —ensuring that consumer rights remain central in decision-making processes.
Here are some of our highlights shaping a fairer, more sustainable marketplace for all:
Over 100 Members engaged for World Consumer Rights Day
On World Consumer Rights Day, our global movement united under the theme A Just Transition to Sustainable Lifestyles. With 690 participants and 120 speakers across 18 events at our Sustainable Lifestyles Summit, and more than 100 Member-led campaigns launched on 15 March, consumers raised their voices loud and clear: sustainable choices must be made more affordable, available and accessible to all.
Shaping Global Agendas
In July, we joined forces with nine Members at the 9th United Nations Conference on Competition and Consumer Protection, putting consumer voices front and centre. Together, we showcased how Members are driving practical solutions and intervened in sessions on food prices, product safety, and digital market fairness—contributing to a landmark draft resolution on product safety now moving to the United Nations General Assembly.
We also strengthened our collective influence with a new Memorandum of Understanding with UN Environment Programme (UNEP) to accelerate climate action and advance people's essential rights and needs.
Powering a People-Centred Clean Energy Transition
The clean energy transition is a global imperative—and consumers are critical to its success. This June, we launched The Impact Initiative: Amplifying Consumer Voices in the Clean Energy Transition, a spotlight on 25+ consumer mobilisation initiatives around the world, demanding a fairer, more affordable and transparent energy transition. This work has since been recognised by the International Energy Agency’s Global Commission on People-Centred Clean Energy Transitions’ Blueprint for Action on Just and Inclusive Energy Transitions.
Shaping the Future of Food through Consumer Dialogue
Food systems remain central to the consumer movement. This year, 130+ global participants came together in a series of Consumer Action Dialogues, with strong representation from Africa and Asia, helping shape the next EAT-Lancet 2.0 Call to Action. Member-led innovations to combat food price shocks were spotlit at both the World Health Assembly and UNCTAD, ensuring consumer realities inform global food governance.
Building Member Capacity and Collective Action
We awarded 40 grants to Members this year, powering community-driven initiatives from tackling plastic waster in Yemen and reviving indigenous seed systems in Kenya, to launching one-stop-shops for renewable energy across Thailand, Colombia and Chile.
Our Anne Fransen Fund continues to support projects with a powerful social impact— such as advancing financial literacy among women in Bangladesh and train community facilitators on safe food practices in Rwanda.
Our global community has grown stronger with 11 new Members joining us from diverse geographies, including Australia, Italy, Japan, Kenya, the USA and more.
Inside the Fair Digital Finance Accelerator
Our Members have been at the heart of pushing for change in digital finance—learning, influencing, and leading the way toward fairer, safer financial systems. We shared the impact story for our Fair Digital Finance Accelerator – a powerful community of 77 Members in low- and middle-income countries – which has shown how Members have benefited from our high-level training, connections, novel insight, and opportunities to build local initiatives. With over 1,000 advocates trained and campaigns launched across the globe, Members have influenced 10+ national policies and close to 50 led innovative initiatives — making digital finance safer and more inclusive. Read our Impact Story here.
Consumer Stories in the Spotlight
Our Purchasing Powers documentary series, produced with BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions, has become their most-watched series ever, reaching 2.2 million views. The film “A Voice in the Marketplace” continues to rank among the top three in engagement, underlining the growing public appetite for consumer-driven change.
Shaping the Digital Future
With artificial intelligence (AI) rapidly reshaping markets, we brought consumer voices to the global stage at the AI for Good Summit in Geneva. Members represented diverse countries such as St Lucia, Netherlands, Morocco and Nigeria and demonstrated how risks in an unregulated sector continue to cut across global borders and impact consumer daily lives.
Members worldwide have been exploring its potential for good – with Consumer Reports (USA), IDEC (Brazil), and others looking at how responsible AI can drive efficiency within consumer protection. This year we will build on the ways Members can both counter AI risks and act on its potential to help organisational efficiency and growth.
Building a Global Response to Scams
Our Consumer Coalition to Stop Scams, a group of close to 40 participants has convened Members, government, industry and international institutions throughout the year to build a strong response to scams. The Coalition is prioritising stronger platform accountability, smarter prevention strategies, and collective evidence to drive action. We are now working with coalition participants to build a first-of-its kind Barometer – designed to help a wider community track, analyse and respond to scams.
As we look toward the rest of 2025, we will continue to push forward together to shape fairer, more resilient systems for all.