In this opinion piece for Australia's ABC News, Joseph Cheer - lecturer and researcher in tourism at Monash University and joint editor of "Tourism, Resilience and Sustainability: Adapting to Social, Political and Economic Change" - writes about recent changes in the "voluntourism" sector, including a shift in what is considered best practices in regard to orphanage volunteering. In the piece, Cheer references Australia's Parliamentary Inquiry on Modern Slavery, which considered, among other topics, orphanage trafficking. Cheer also cites an article by Kate van Doore of Griffith University Law School and Forget Me Not (a member of Australia's ReThink Orphanages network) which discusses how poverty and lack of access to education and other resources are contributing factors to children being placed in orphanages and the ways in which orphanage operators exploit children and their families.
While the opinion piece argues that the tourism sector does not need to ban orphanage volunteering altogether, the author does offer several suggestions for more ethical volunteer practices, including better vetting of volunteers and staff and supporting organizations that seek to deinstitutionalize children. "But children are still best cared for in family environments," writes Cheer, "and institutional care should be a temporary measure."