When we hear the word ‘orphanage’ we assume that the children living there are orphans, without parents or families to care for them. In fact, 4 out of 5 of the estimated 8 million children growing up in orphanages across the world today have at least one living parent, and many more have extended families, who could care for them if given support. Many so-called orphanages run like businesses, making money out of unsuspecting visitors who want to do something good to help children. Unfortunately, stories of orphanage scams, which commodify and exploit children and take advantage of the goodwill of volunteers, tourists and donors have become all too common.

The question remains that if 4 out of 5 children living in orphanages today have family who could care for them, why are they growing up in institutions? The answer is often poverty and lack of access to services. Unfortunately, some families just cannot meet the cost of supporting their children or live in areas where services are inadequate. Sending their children to grow up in residential care may be the only way they can guarantee an education and adequate healthcare. Children should never be removed from their families due to poverty. Families experiencing poverty or other stressors have a right to access support to help them care for their children. The funding being directed to orphanages through international donations and volunteer programs is only preventing money from going to find real solutions to the issue which are keeping families apart. This funding needs to be redirected to support the development of services that help children stay with their families and in their communities. Read the story of a young Mum from Nepal and how she was faced with an impossible decision to make on behalf of her children. 

The idea of playing or working with children for a few weeks or months sounds like great fun, but how much choice is the child actually given when it comes to participating? Children are not attractions and should never be treated like something to tick off the bucket list. It is vital for the safety and well-being of all children involved that the volunteer program be designed with their best interests at the absolute centre - not the interests of the paying ‘customer’ i.e. the volunteer.

The vast majority of volunteers head out to countries throughout Africa, Asia and South America with the very best of intentions - they want to help. However, if good intentions alone were enough we would have solved all the world’s problems by now. Unfortunately, some social issues require qualified professionals with the experience to ensure that no unintentional harm is being produced. For example, children with additional support needs deserve to be cared for by a knowledgeable and qualified individual who will be present in that child’s life longer than a few months. As a volunteer, it is important to consider if you could do what the role requires of you in your own community at home? If you wouldn’t be able to because you don’t have the relevant experience of qualifications, why should you be able to do it in another part of the world?

Volunteers often express a desire to give children in orphanages attention and show them love, but what they are unaware of is that children need that love and attention to come from a consistent caregiver. Allowing volunteers to care for children for short periods only exacerbates issues of attachment, exposing children to a revolving door of caregivers and a repeated experience of forming bonds, only for those bonds to break when the volunteer leaves. This is very harmful to children and negatively impacts their ability to form healthy trusting relationships.

Orphanage tourism and volunteering is an extremely unregulated industry, which means that anyone can gain access to children - regardless of their intentions. Although you only want good things for children, sadly others see this as the perfect opportunity to have unvetted access, often completely alone, to a vulnerable child. The only way to prevent child sexual abuse like this is to stop the practice of day trips and volunteer projects in orphanages. Most volunteer-sending countries do not allow volunteers to have contact with children in out-of-home care services. The same restrictions should apply to overseas volunteering.

Like any market, if the demand for a product or service increases, so must the supply. As orphanage tourism has grown in popularity the demand for orphanages and so-called ‘orphans’ residing in them has also grown, leading to an increase in the number of orphanages opening worldwide. So where are these children coming from? Put simply, children are often being separated from their families and communities unnecessarily and unlawfully to meet this demand. Sometimes parents send their children, believing they will have a better quality of life if they live in an orphanage. Other times orphanages recruit children, offering free education and other services to poor families. There are also more insidious practices at play. To ensure they can meet the demand for ‘orphans’, the most corrupt orphanages have been linked to orphanage trafficking. Orphanage trafficking involves actively recruiting children from families, often using deception or coercion, falsifying their status as orphans, and placing them in orphanages where they experience exploitation or are used to solicit donations which profit the operators. The very desire to volunteer or support children abroad is creating a demand for ‘orphans’ and ‘orphanages’.

Well-intentioned volunteers, donors and tourists are being misled. They believe they are supporting vulnerable children but are really bolstering an industry which profits by exploiting children, including as tourist attractions. There are significantly more orphanages near tourist hotspots, especially in countries such as Cambodia, Nepal and Kenya, where children can be forced to beg, sell souvenirs or perform dance shows (all forms of child labour) in order to elicit money from visitors. In the worst cases, children can be sexual exploited or kept in slavery-like conditions, left hungry, sickly and in sub-standard conditions, to elicit greater sympathy and donations from visitors. Many orphanages across the developing world are unregistered and operating unlawfully, making them very difficult to regulate.