Assessing Volunteer Tourism (Voluntourism) and Traveler Philanthropy
by Daniela Papi
I recently read a blog, one of many, which was striving to analyze how positive “voluntourism” can be. The questions tend to revolve around one core question, “If volunteers are unskilled or getting involved in unnecessary or low priority work, and they themselves are getting a lot out of the experience, are they really doing good?”
As I was thinking about this and trying to put my ideas into words, an image popped into my head: a spectrum of “positive impact” that ranges from 100% financial contribution to 100% volunteer contribution. This implies that if your volunteer time is:
a) necessary and high priority for the organization or community,
b) introducing locally unavailable skilled labor or
c) providing volunteer services that would otherwise be costly to the organization,
then financial support in addition may not be necessary. However, if none of the above applies, then there should be a donation requirement offsetting the costs of hosting volunteers. In either case, financial contributions help sustain ongoing project needs, thereby making the volunteer trip valuable beyond the activities taking place during short-term volunteer projects.
Does that make sense? If it doesn’t, perhaps this chart will illustrate the point. Based on my experiences, if volunteer tour operators or traveler philanthropy projects fall on or above the dotted line, they will positively impact their partner projects through the introduction of skilled and necessary labor on one end of the spectrum, significant funding on the other end of the spectrum, or a combination falling somewhere between the two.
At PEPY, participants volunteer time to a short-term project with the understanding that the most significant part of their contribution is the funds they provide to sustain ongoing projects. Additionally, they receive on-site education which, ideally, translates into future involvement. We believe that everyone, even “unskilled laborers”, has the ability to contribute. Even if volunteers lack knowledge about the issue or program, they can contribute by learning more and promoting awareness to others, and by providing financial support.
For me, the essentials for successful volunteer tourism are honest marketing (ie: being open about what portion of participant fees are going to the projects they visit and the relationships involved), setting clear expectations both for the communities/programs visited and the travelers, and an understanding of the diagram above. If volunteers are not contributing resources otherwise unavailable (i.e. high-skilled labor), then funding is needed to maintain an overall positive impact. Those organizations operating in the red area have a tendency to focus more on the needs/wants of the travelers, often conveying a false sense that their impact is extremely positive and necessary, without following through on the commitment to make that statement true.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this. What do you think about this chart and these ideas? Please comment below.
* If you are a voluntourism operator and would like to contribute to the creation of a self-check tool on Volunteer Tourism Effective Practices, please contact voluntourism@pepyride.org. We’d love your input to help make all of us better volunteer tour operators and participants!
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Comments
I personally think honest marketing is key, how often have we seen on websites \'you will enjoy playing with the kids in the morning and then sightseeing in the afternoon\'?? There\'s never a mention on most sites about why the community genuinely needs help, what sort of help you\'ll be able to give and \'successes\' of past volunteers.
I would love to see voluntourism marketing change to focus on the communities needs and not the travelers.
I also think the marketing point is very valid for travelers philanthropy programs as well as fundraising tours/events. I recently read an article arguing whether a version of the \"Aids Ride\", where only 30% of less of the fundraising went to non-profit work, was indeed doing \"good\". In my opinion, the point was missed in the framing of the question in some ways (though of course the argument could be made that such an event should never be allowed to have 501(c)3, or tax-free status). Rather than ask \"is it good\", I would ask, did they tell you that from the beginning. No one argues with Patagonia about their \"1% for the earth\" initiative, instead they commend them. Good for Patagonia for donating 1%! Why? Because Patagonia wasn\'t claiming to be saving the world through their initiative to begin with, they were claiming to make high quality outdoor clothing, and saving the world, 1% at a time, is something they do on the side.
People can make an informed decision about where to put their money if they know what they are signing up for and where their money is going before the purchase a product or sign up for a tour. It will come to a point, I hope, where the public will demand that transparency upfront as, without it, they will think the operator has something to hide.
That was a major reason why we split the tour fee and fundraising requirement of PEPY, so people know which portion of their money is going to which cause. We would bring in a lot more money if we allowed people to fundraise for the entire cost of their trip, but we want to be transparent to donors about which funds are being used to pay for trip costs and which funds are going to the NGO.
I couldn\'t agree more with your points on honest marketing and setting clear expectations. I believe fair play with an eye on positive community impact are basic expectations of industry participants, especially an industry that is heading \"mainstream.\"
These types of discussions are helpful to clarify and to help us learn to better assess voluntourism -- for the traveler and the tour companies.
Why? Because Patagonia
wasn\'t claiming to be saving the world to begin with. They claimed to be making high quality outdoor goods and saving the world was something they did on the side.
If voluntourism operators or fundraising travel events are open and honest with where their money goes, people can make more informed decisions about what events they want to join and where they want to donate. This was one of the major reasons I wanted PEPY Tours to have separate fundraising and tour fees. In that way, everyone knows that the trip fee comes from one place and the fundraising goes straight to the NGOs. I think we would actually bring in more travelers and perhaps more fundraising if we allowed people to fundraise for the entire portion of their trips, but I think having more financial transparency in voluntourism is going to be the key to distinguishing responsible operators in the future. I hope there is a time when every operator will be forced to disclose information about where their funding goes because the public will demand it before signing up.
Given only my style of voluntourism, I would do away with all funding to communities altogether, bringing volunteers only for service help, capacity building, or helping \"learn how to fish\"... never providing the \"fish\" itself. Granted that funds brought by volunteers can help crucial funding criseses in the communities and organisations, but how many times have you noticed that the communities will accept a volunteer only because they bring funds...
I work with both non-funding volunteers and funding volunteers... and I can tell you that it is far more trouble with funding volunteers, as money causes all sorts of problems and the organistions are far too eager to accept volunteers because of this... In our non-funding volunteer programs, the organisation knows very clearly that it can only get money for a service provided... (e.g. bedding, and food, excursions, carbon offsetting, etc..) but no freebies... Alternatively, they can work alongside the volunteers writing proposals, and work with them to learn the skills required for proposal writing, requesting for funds and fund management. This is crucial, there is far too much fund mismanagement because no one has been taught \"how to fish\" as providing the fish is far too cheap (comparitively) and also easier to sell.
I would base the argument over long term vs. short terms volunteers based on requirements... talk about the irrelevance of short term volunteers at Musular Dystrophy Foundation in Nepal, where one day planned volunteering of a good physiotherapist (actual massages as well as training) could be worth a lot... I have seen this with my own eyes... Also there are far too many volunteers who think they can actually change the world if they come for anything over six months...
Remember this, in most countries where you will be going, there has already been decades of development who have barely managed to scratch the surface of development.
You go to contribute to this slow slow process, not to change anything!
http://pepyride.ning.com/profiles/blogs/assessing-volunteer-tourism
Thank you so much for continuing the discussion, Raj!
I just wanted to pipe in that I agree with Raj but am also torn because D makes a very convincing argument to provide funds as well.
I feel that since a lot of operators do look at voluntourism as simply a \'tour\' and a \'product\' they cannot guarantee that the will be sending volunteers there in 5 years. Maybe the country is no longer popular or maybe travelers simply dont want to participate in that sort of project anymore. If the company is constantly giving the community money then when the operator pulls the program the community will be in a far worse situation than it started in, right? I\'m against aide reliance I have to say but I know there must be a way to do it sustainably.
What do you think of i-to-i\'s article on this? http://www.i-to-i.com/about-i2i/ethical-policy.html