Translator: Natasha Greenhouse Reviewer: Pari ‌Szi
The Cape Coast Castle
was used for the slave trade for centuries.
Ghanaians were captured and struggled to survive in dungeons
until it was their turn to walk through the door of no return,
a door that led them to their final destination.
In 2018, I walked through that door and I asked myself:
Why is poverty still a business?
I’m Andrea Doreste, and I’ll explain how to decolonize volunteering
to achieve self-sufficiency in sustainable development projects.
It all begins in Aklobotonu,
a town in eastern Ghana, in the Volta region.
It’s one of the poorest and most neglected areas of the country,
where government resources are barely felt.
My sister Mar and I lived there for one month, and during that time
we realized the shortcomings they suffered in their quality of life
and their essential human rights.
And it was then that we created a work team
and founded Nukoko, which means smile in Ewé, the local language.
Together we sought solutions to all those problems
that everyone else had overlooked.
The beginning was complicated,
since we didn’t know how we were going to communicate,
and I still remember when we looked for a mobile phone and SIM card
to send us the first messages. That was a total adventure.
In the beginning, we worked as a traditional NGO,
and in our first year we built Grace Academy,
a school that offers education to children over the age of three.
We also formed a sewing workshop where many women
found their first job.
We built two wells, the main access to clean water.
And we also installed solar panels, the main electricity source.
Additionally, we offered over 15 scholarships so that young people
could go to the cities to enroll in higher education.
Nowadays, those of age go to college.
But these days, we’ve realized that what’s important isn’t what you do,
it’s how you do it.
In Nukoko, we depended on local workers and bought all materials
in the market.
And of course, we had volunteer opportunities, given that we believed
that’s how cooperation should work.
Throughout the years, different volunteer groups have traveled
through Nukoko.
With the best intention to build and to give classes for a few weeks.
With flights, visas and other costs, these volunteers have spent a total
of over EUR 100 000.
Had we known this before, we could have invested this money
in salaries and materials, and we could have built four schools
like Grace Academy.
But then of course, they wouldn’t have had their summer experience.
It’s what’s known as voluntourism.
Groups of youths that have short stays among vulnerable communities.
These youths receive public recognition when they post on social media
photos of kids with worn out clothes, for instance.
But really the only thing they do is promote demeaning stereotypes,
as it’s common that these volunteers leave behind dirty and worn out clothes
so that the community reuses it.
Other consequences of voluntourism are problems with attachment,
given that only three days are needed for a child in a vulnerable situation
to develop a bond with their main caretaker.
And what happens then if this caretaker or teacher changes every two weeks?
These problems will extend throughout their life.
If we continue to prioritize our need for notoriety
over the needs of the community,
we continue to promote patterns of colonialism.
And the first step to decolonization is to listen to the community,
and that is why we’ll now turn to Felix to tell us his opinion about volunteering
and sustainable development.
Hello.
My name is Felix from Ghana. I’m a teacher.
Why people bring hope and unity to the community?
We can see that change is possible,
but we need independence, and that is not good for our future.
We need people to join the communities and work together,
we need you to invest in our local businesses
and to help us promote good salaries, so we can pay for our children’s education.
We need the volunteers to be part of activities that we have.
And we also encourage you to invest in the NGOs
that come to the communities to support us.
Thank you very much.
As Felix said, volunteers generate faith and hope for change.
Aklobotonu was a community that was moving to other cities, without education
or prospects for the future.
Additionally, they were also migrating to other countries with all the consequences
we know of those who try to look for a better future in Europe.
Education is the motor of development, it’s the central axis of Nukoko,
and we can’t let these youths’ education depend on donations
and on a volunteer force that’s fragile and unstable.
We need to ensure that it’s their own families, to create a solid base,
and that it’s they themselves who pay for their children’s education.
And that’s why, as Felix said, we should invest in local businesses
and create stable jobs and pay workers fair wages.
Because investing isn’t donating.
When we invest, we want our resources to grow, remain firm and endure
over time.
An investment generates responsibility in the person who invests
and the person who receives the resources.
That’s why we couldn’t stay with the first solutions.
We needed to go further, to help families grow economically, and that it be them
that invested in their children’s education.
It’s then when the project will be self-sufficient.
And we don’t know whether that will be this year or next.
What we do know is that we’re working towards that, which is why we’re investing
in kente cloths, traditional fabrics that the community is giving value
thanks to sewing workshops. We’re also doing it with new technologies,
organizing computer classes, and we’re going to do it for agriculture
with irrigation systems and tractors for ploughing
because we can do it well.
We have the opportunity, the ability and the resources to do it well.
Those of you who have participated in the world of collaboration
are probably familiar with these concepts, but we want to reach everyone thinking
for the first time, “I’ll volunteer in a way that has an impact on me
this summer.”
Because it’s the community that should be the one to feel the impact.
We recognize the efforts of the women
in developing the sewing workshops
and we also recognize all the families
who have abandoned the idea of child labor
in favor of sending their children to school.
We also recognize all of the youths who’ve abandoned fear
and have gone to the cities in search of change.
All of this guided by Felix, Gladys, Joyce, Pati, Sara, Mar, Luis
and every person who through their profession
has listened to the community and has guided it through this change.
It’s in our hands that the volunteers not be volunteers,
but rather that they be agents of social change who listen to the community
and work with it to determine the root of complex problems
and search for solutions present in the community.
It’s in our hands to invest in organizations
that promote local businesses in search of sustainable development,
thereby eradicating colonialism.
Thank you very much.