“Respect is at the heart of responsible volunteering. We established people and places to enable volunteers to engage with communities abroad, to share their skills and knowledge and to work together as partners to achieve their host’s goals. Mutual respect between host and guest is crucial in such a partnership. people and places volunteers never replace a local employee: they work as colleagues, contributing as part of the team, and enjoying the privileges of being an “insider”. 

Our volunteers travel as paying guests who roll up their sleeves and muck in – paying guests because they pay their way. Too often when working abroad I have come across “volunteers” who make demands on community resources to enable then to do their volunteering. Our volunteers pay for their board and lodging, local transport, liaison with the project and full time support, and each of them makes a donation to the project they work on. If resources are needed for them to achieve their allocated task in the project, they discuss it with their hosts and can buy what they need locally. As paying guests, they neither become a burden on the community they have travelled to assist, nor do they impose their own objectives.” 

Read the full article on the effectiveness of short term volunteering here