Volunteering for Copade: What you need to know

On a steamy August night on the Honduran island of Utila, 10 Spanish backpackers volunteering with the Spanish fair trade organization Copade - short for Fundación Comercio para el Desarrollo (Trade Foundation for Development) - lounged in deck hammocks, reminiscing about the day’s snorkeling trip while imbibing on rum and Coca-Cola. But the conversation quickly turned from details of multicolored fish and nurse shark sightings to more serious discussions on how they could continue helping the Honduran women they served with their technical business and communications skills over the past month. The questions the group had are similar to those any group of short-term volunteers might ask at the tail end of their travels: Did we really have an impact? Did the locals appreciate our efforts? Will this trip mean anything to our professional lives, or was it just an exotic vacation? A unique program In a world of poverty and recent economic hardship for the middle classes, altruistic travels are about as close as socially responsible citizens can get to a guilt-free vacation. Copade’s programs, for instance, give its recipient communities as well as its volunteers professional opportunities not commonly found on short-term trips that involve things like painting houses or digging holes for latrines. That’s because a Copade volunteer has to have a heart and a skill for the poor. The nongovernmental organization’s main focus is to enhance production and international sales for some 17 crafts cooperatives in Honduras and Bolivia. It seeks out volunteers with expertise in areas such as psychology, fashion design, business, communications and tourism. The central volunteer program is a monthlong summer trip to Honduras to work alongside crafts people who need new marketing and business plans for improved international exports. On this year’s trip, volunteers successfully revived three struggling women’s cooperatives that are now selling masses of jewlry, clothing and home décor to Spain. Copade is not the only fair trade organization to use this skilled volunteer strategy. What makes it stand out is that it encourages career climbers to bring their creative ideas to the development table. How to get involved Say you want some developing country exposure but can’t afford a two- or three-year volunteer commitment halfway through your career. It may be that your skill set can be structured around Copade’s summer cooperative visits. Or, say you’ve got an idea for a paper on fair trade, but you want some level of logistical support while doing research overseas. Copade might be able to connect you with Honduran locals, and your work might double as a new social outreach plan for the NGO. Spaces are almost filled for the Honduras tour in August 2009. The written and oral application process, open to people of all nationalities who speak proficient Spanish, closes at the end of November. But Copade is also interested in receiving proposals from people who could volunteer during other times of the year. Copade can provide free housing at its headquarters in San Pedro Sula, and it also asks recipient communities to give volunteers modest food and accommodation in exchange for services. That said, participants must pay the bulk of their overhead costs. Short trips with long-term professional rewards So is it worth it? Why not take summer classes at a local college or just hike the Mayan Trail with a Lonely Planet Guide? Why go learn about development if you’re not going to spend two years embedded with the people you are trying to help? The general consensus among this summer’s Copade volunteers was that this program allowed them a chance to do a little bit of everything for a bit more than the cost of a plane ticket. As a result of their technical collaborations in the artisan cooperatives, dozens of Honduran women now have steady work. Through craftmaking and social interaction, the volunteers gained a better understanding of Honduran culture and the struggle to preserve it. Finally, weekend trips to the country’s jungles, Mayan ruins and Caribbean islands offered them geographic markers and relaxing getaways where they could bond and discuss ideas for future networking and collaboration. “Copade is a small organization made up mostly of people who are young and enthusiastic about their work,” said Esperanza Bringas. “It’s a luxury to have these workmates and learn from them every day.” Two years ago, Bringas, a freelance fashion and industrial designer, cobbled together projects through numerous clients. Today, Copade contracts the bulk of her designs, a fact that makes her summer volunteer stints with artisans even more inspiring. That’s about the way it should be, said Sandra Maristegui, who serves as the Madrid-based director of Copade’s fair trade stores around Spain and as the organization’s volunteer coordinator. She told this summer’s volunteers from the start that the work conducted in Honduras is only a small piece of the development puzzle. “A month is a very short time to make big changes … They had to be realistic about how much they could get done out there in the field,” she explained. “We wanted them to understand that the project began in Madrid, continued in Honduras, and then kept on going back in Madrid.” Rocio Marin works at a corporate public relations company in Madrid, but hopes to one day translate those skills to publicity and documentation of humanitarian organizations. She photographed and videotaped Copade’s Honduran projects for interactive displays in Copade stores, then wrote about the group’s experience for the organization’s website. She hopes this project may one day help her segue into documentary filmmaking or serving as the communications director of an NGO. “I work in public relations, but I love images, especially photography. It’s an indispensable element for sensitizing society,” Marín said. “I believe this [experience] makes me a more complete professional, and it gives me a much clearer and broader vision of the world in which I want to work.” Copade volunteer Maria del Cristo Rodrigo Cabrera recently graduated from the University of Granada with a degree in international development. She came to Honduras to explore tourism routes that would usher vacationing foreigners, Honduran nationals and local schoolchildren through the country’s rainforests, where they could visit environmentally sensitive woodworking cooperatives for purchase of the crafts. Her study doubled as a senior thesis and a future business plan for Copade. “Traveling in a group helped me to have a broader vision, as well as see places through the eyes of tourists,” Rodrigo said. Psychologist Eva Gallego’s volunteer job was to create better cross-cultural communication between the Honduran artisans and Copade’s design and marketing team. Back home in Madrid, she works with labor unions and immigrants. “For someone like me who works in immigrant outreach in Spain, it’s very relevant to know the base reality of the countries of origin from which these people who emigrate to Spain are coming,” she said. As for the concerns these Spaniards expressed about their own work in Honduras, Rodrigo has found a satisfactory answer. “Sure, solidarity vacations or short-term internships run the risk of being superficial,” she acknowledged. “But I still believe what’s important is the consciousness that the person gains from going to these places and the respect they show people while they’re there.” Read more career advice articles.