According to Save the Children Australia, popular voluntourism destinations for Australians such as Bali, Thailand and Cambodia have seen the number of orphanages increase by up to 500 per cent since the trend began.
“Most people mean well, so ‘voluntourists’ are … choosing holidays or holiday packages and they want an element of doing good in it, and orphanages seem to have been one of the things that attracts people,” Save the Children child protection expert Karen Flanagan said.
“Unscrupulous people in developing countries are seeing that opportunity and they’re taking children from families or trafficking children, from poor families generally, to meet this demand.”
