people and places matches skills and experience to need – our role is to enable both volunteers and local communities to gain mutual benefits. Crucial to this role are our relationships with local partners. Read More.
The Cape Town Declaration states that tourism should ‘actively involve the local community in planning and decision-making, and provide capacity-building to make this a reality.’ We believe that this approach should also be applied to volunteering, and it is the way we work. Every one of the projects on our site originates in the local community – NOT with us! Working with our local partners, communities can identify specific projects where they need help – our job is to match individual volunteer skills to those needs.

We achieve this as economically as we can – if you’re reading this, you’ve already found our ‘brochure’ – there are no glossy and expensive print runs and mail outs from people and places! We want to see volunteers’ money being spent where it is needed most – in their host communities.

So, you’ve found the site, you’ve found a project or destination to suit you, and you want to go next month … now what happens?

This is where we come in – your registration is the first step, but we shall require a lot more information from you, and you will require a lot more information from us … and it’s unlikely that you can go as soon as next month! Responsible volunteering is not a decision to be taken lightly. You need time and information to be sure that it’s the right placement for you and that you will really be doing something worthwhile. We also need time and information to be sure that the communities will benefit from volunteers’ work.