Maintaining our commitment to our communities, volunteers and staff

#CampsEffect

Our culture is guided by a principle we call the Camps Effect.  It describes the positive impact we commit to delivering to our clients and our planet.

If you are one of our clients, we will continue to work hard until you have either received the original experience you committed to, a viable alternative arrangement or, a refund.  For the planet, our work is now beginning to make sure that we continue to create a positive impact despite Covid-19 and zero travellers.

We have protected the jobs and pay of our camp staff around the globe and whilst (for the next few months at least) our projects will no longer benefit from the thousands of volunteer days that would have taken place this year, we are absolutely committed to maintaining our support to our partner communities – through our project objectives and the job security that Camps provides.

The economic and social impact of Covid-19 has hit the developing countries we work in most severely, but though these communities are cut off from the benefits of tourism for the time-being, we are committed to ensuring that no-one gets left behind.

Putting the #CampsEffect into action

We have a global team of incredible, passionate local staff who are permanently based in our expedition locations. They’ve been working hard behind-the-scenes to re-define our project plans for this year, prioritising our most vital work and reallocating our staff to pick up where our volunteers cannot.

These are our plans for the next few months.

In Latin America we are helping communities build important infrastructure

In Costa Rica, we are currently constructing a Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Centre – a vital facility to support the most vulnerable members of the community at Camp Terraba. This project was started by our volunteer teams in 2019 and this year our Camp Costa Rica team plan to pitch in to take on the next phase of construction, building the walls of the centre.

Over in Camp Moray, Peru, the community have been using makeshift market stalls throughout this pandemic to exchange agricultural products and basic necessities. With the help of our local crew at Camp Peru, we’ll be constructing safer and more substantial market areas to support them.

Our long-term project at Camp Kuri Kucho, Ecuador, is constructing greenhouses for the community to grow their own food. We currently have a greenhouse that is 25% complete, so our Camp Ecuador team will be joining forces to get this finished for local families to benefit from as soon as possible.

We’re continuing our most vital community work in Asia

Anyone who has joined us on expedition in Cambodia will know just how impactful our water projects are within these rural communities. Our Camp Cambodia team will be continuing this important work: in Camp Beng Pae we’re planning to build a village well and work on the village dam conservation, whilst in Camp Beng Mealea we’ll be making water storage pots for local families and maintaining the gravity water pipe. We’ll also be helping to support locals with rice planting to ensure a sustainable food supply for the region.

In Borneo, we are currently working on some large-scale community facilities in three of our camps: Camp Batu Puteh, Camp Tinangol and Camp Bongkud. Here our local staff plan to continue the fantastic work of our volunteer teams in previous years and will be installing roofing, plastering and cementing towork towards finishing the construction of new youth and community centres.

We’re working from the ground up in Africa to create long-term support for communities

Our Camp Kenya crew have developed an exciting new project that will provide sustainable, long-term to the local community near Camp Muhaka. Our team will be putting the groundwork in to develop a permaculture farm with an education centre, providing substantial harvest for locals in the medium-term and reducing deforestation in the area through educating the community on sustainable livelihoods. We are very excited to get started on this project and look forward to welcoming our Kenya expedition teams next year to continue the work on our long-term goals.

Due to current travel restrictions in the region, we’re yet to develop any further projects within our Africa camps, but we’re working closely with our teams on the ground to provide localised support where we can.

Stay up to date with our Camps’ Diaries on social media

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be bringing you live updates from our teams on the ground, keeping you up to date with our progress on these projects.

Make sure you follow us on Instagram and Facebook to see the latest updates, meet some of our local crew and find out what’s going on in Camps.