Globalteer

Who We Are

Globalteer’s vision is a world where human and animal suffering are minimised and the future of our planet is safeguarded by effectively harnessing the goodwill of people who share our vision. We work to achieve our vision and charitable objectives through volunteer placements and support for community, conservation, and animal welfare projects and programmes. We are a 100% not-for-profit, registered charity, operating in South East Asia and Latin America.

Our charitable objectives entail:

• Promoting sustainable development for the benefit of the public by the relief of poverty and the improvement of the conditions of life in socially disadvantaged communities.
  
• Promoting humane behaviour towards animals by providing appropriate care, protection, treatment and security for animals which are in need of attention by reason of sickness, maltreatment, poor circumstances or ill usage.
  

We are made up of a small team of permanent staff, with offices located in Peru and Cambodia. Our volunteers and donors come to us from all over the world.

What We Do

By placing volunteers into our programmes and partner projects, we aim to truly make an impact in responsible, sustainable ways. Our strategies include:

• To work with projects that meet genuine local needs, as identified by the communities they serve, and that meet our criteria for sustainability and responsibility.
  
• To work closely with our partner projects to ensure that all volunteer placements are of genuine value to the project and are in keeping with the projects’ short-term goals and long-term objectives.
  
• To place suitably experienced volunteers within approved partner projects on tasks where there is a local shortage of necessary skills.
  
• To encourage the transfer of volunteer skills to local staff wherever possible.
  
• To help fund the continued development of partner projects through volunteer donations and post-placement volunteer fundraising.
  
• To help all our partner projects to become fully self-funded and locally managed with minimal requirement for external support.
  
• To continually assess the needs of the communities with whom we work and identify new partners and new initiatives as necessary.
  

As part of our commitment to responsible volunteering, we are not only concerned with the needs of our projects - we also care about our volunteers. From the moment we confirm a volunteer placement, we work to make sure each volunteer is prepared and feels comfortable before they travel to a new country. We give comprehensive, tailored travel and health advice, send packing lists, and make sure all volunteers understand their roles at the projects. We also communicate regularly by email or Skype before each volunteer sets off, so that they know exactly what to expect when they arrive. We believe the better prepared a volunteer is, the more of an impact he or she can make at each project. 

Furthermore, we are one of the pioneers of responsible volunteering. We have introduced detailed and robust child protection policies into many overseas projects and are one of the few volunteer organisations that insist on background checks for all staff and volunteers working with children.

As a registered charity in the UK, we are 100% not-for-profit – we must use all monies received to promote our charitable objectives. So the more money we raise, the more we can invest in helping the projects with which we work.

Where We Work

Globalteer works with 22 different community and animal welfare projects in 9 countries within South East Asia and Latin America – Argentina, Cambodia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Peru, and Thailand. We partner with 3 separate elephant sanctuaries, 7 wildlife rescue and animal welfare projects, 4 conservation programmes, and 8 community and teaching programmes, 2 of which are run solely by Globalteer.